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submitted 11 months ago by throws_lemy@lemmy.nz to c/news@lemmy.world
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[-] Wahots@pawb.social 212 points 11 months ago

This is literally why we have apex predators such as wolves. They help clamp down on the old and the sick so that prions (mad cow disease) does not spread to other species or humans. It cannot infect wolves.

When you kill off all the apex predators, like when Montana governor Greg Gianforte authorized the massacre of 100 wolves, you see explosions of extremely dangerous diseases and land degradation as deer damage tree roots, gardens, meadows, streams, and farms.

Not only that, but killing members of wolf packs causes their families to fall apart and everyone to scatter. That means wolves alone. Which cannot hunt pack animals which require coordination. So then they go after the easiest meal: dumbass farm animals who have zero survival instincts and whose ranchers no longer employ people to look after the herds in great enough numbers like the olden days. The cycle then perpetuates, as mad-cow contaminated soils spread and spread....

[-] ridethisbike@lemmy.world 86 points 11 months ago

Damn.... It's almost like we should leave mother nature the fuck alone

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[-] otterpop@lemmy.world 30 points 11 months ago

Can't infect wolves? I'm no expert here but I don't feel like a vertebrate mammal with a brain could be completely immune to prions. Do you have any more information on that claim?

[-] Wahots@pawb.social 53 points 11 months ago

It's in the OP article. They haven't found any infections yet, and it doesn't appear to affect them. Apex predators have, prior to human intervention, always hunted the old, the young, and the sick. Mother nature appears to have found a way around apex predators all dying from disease to balance the environment.

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[-] vexikron@lemmy.zip 161 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

If a mad-cow-like disease jumped the barrier to humans and began spreading through Americans, the main problem in eradicating it would be that basically no one would be able to tell the difference from the average 'Enthusiastic' Republican Voter and someone whose brain is melting due to an actual pathogen.

[-] Sheeple@lemmy.world 73 points 11 months ago

Lucky for us prions do not spread except via ingestion...

Realises that we wanted to eat the rich

[-] PrinceWith999Enemies@lemmy.world 20 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

We’re actually not sure about that. Some prions do spread by eating the meat of infected animals, but I think we can be pretty sure that’s not what’s happening in a wild deer population. Prions can also be found in the environment, including deposited on grasses and plants, where that can last a very long time.

We do not know if this disease is or will become communicable to predator animals or what the potential is for environmental spread to livestock. We do know a bit more about the BSE than some others, but there’s a bunch we know exist that we know little to nothing about, and it’s guaranteed there’s more out there that we haven’t encountered yet.

[-] Daxtron2@startrek.website 9 points 11 months ago

Deer can and do eat meat when available

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[-] Bonehead@kbin.social 12 points 11 months ago

Just eat the meaty parts, avoid the brain and spinal cord and you're all good.

[-] Mycatiskai@lemmy.ca 11 points 11 months ago

The problem is that the brain is the part you want to splatter all over the Italian marble floors of their mansions.

New plan live butchering so that the brain and spine is still intact and no need to worry about Mad Bougie disease.

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[-] sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 9 points 11 months ago

I don't think enough people are eating venison regularly for a this prion to be a serious threat even if it manages to transmit to humans

[-] vexikron@lemmy.zip 17 points 11 months ago

Have you seen zombie movies? It only takes ONE unassuming hunter... and then it immediately mutates into blah blah magic nonsense ensues...

and then it is airborne, and bloodborne

...

You are correct of course. =P

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[-] Wahots@pawb.social 14 points 11 months ago

Shoot an infected deer in the head or have it otherwise die violently on the ground. Prions can last in the soil for years and years. Misfolded proteins are basically invulnerable, even in shit like autoclaves. If cows eat grass that has prions on them, that shit could potentially jump. And a lot of people ranch their cattle on public lands where infected deer are, and where wolves are unavailable due to politicians, who would otherwise prevent infected deer from spreading.

The best thing that we can do is have wolves clamp down on the few infected deer immediately rather than generate large pools of infection that then start cross-contaminating domestic livestock. Prions and ebola are the two things that really keep me up at night.

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[-] donescobar@lemmy.world 51 points 11 months ago

From the little I’ve read on this it appears that the infectious cells favor a functional brain so that means all maga evangelical republicans are safe.

[-] shunir@lemmy.world 22 points 11 months ago

That's not really a good news though. ;(

[-] senorblackbean@lemmy.world 47 points 11 months ago
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[-] CobblerScholar@lemmy.world 40 points 11 months ago

Oh its totally fine it's not like we've made the planet warmer allowing viruses to mutilate easier and for longer or like how we haven't been taking part in a centuries long destruction of the deers native habitat forcing them into populated areas right?... Right?

[-] rtxn@lemmy.world 43 points 11 months ago
[-] MotoAsh@lemmy.world 15 points 11 months ago

I mean, doesn't that reinforce their point, since many other pathogens are even more touchy on heat?

[-] girlfreddy@lemmy.ca 60 points 11 months ago

It's actually worse than a virus.

Once an environment is infected, the pathogen is extremely hard to eradicate. It can persist for years in dirt or on surfaces, and scientists report it is resistant to disinfectants, formaldehyde, radiation and incineration at 600C (1,100F).

[-] match@pawb.social 41 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

The pathogen in question is a prion (a mutant contagious protein molecule)

[-] PrinceWith999Enemies@lemmy.world 39 points 11 months ago

Biologist here. That’s not where I’d put the association. I’m going to simplify things a bit because this is going to be a long post, but hopefully this will help.

I think you’re thinking about the effects of heat on proteins. We can destabilize macromolecules by heating them, sometimes causing permanent damage. That takes a lot of heat, though. The planet would be long dead before we had to worry about the environmental temperature denaturing proteins.

Biologist related joke: How do you unscramble an egg?
Feed it to a chicken.

So, when the microscope was invented, people were startled to discover what were obviously living organisms in a drop of pond water. Discovery led to discovery, and we ended up learning about bacteria and the germ theory of disease. Some bacteria are really good (in that without them you would die), and some are really bad (like if you get infected you could die), but most are neutral. I do not believe there’s any direct connection between the global temperature and the rate of mutation in bacteria. That’s not to say there’s not a connection between climate change and disease rates. I’ll talk about that later.

So later on we discovered viruses. Viruses are much smaller than bacteria. While a bacterium is a cell with a whole physiology going on, a virus consists of a bit of genetic material bound in an envelope of proteins. The envelope will gain access to a cell and inject its genetic material, which the cell’s normal processes will start to work on, producing more viruses. Many people don’t consider viruses “alive.” I do, because I’m approaching it from a different direction. Again, the rate of mutation there isn’t really directly affected by a rise in global temperature, but there is a disease rate relationship.

We only discovered prions more recently. They’re even more simple than viruses. They’re really just a protein. We don’t understand them very well yet. The danger comes from the fact that prions can force other proteins to become copies of themselves. They can cause things like mad cow disease. They’re incredibly hardy and don’t mutate faster because of climate change. They’re very scary diseases with no known treatment and in some cases unknown transmission paths.

This one is a prion.

I think we can find correlations between disease in animals and climate change. Climate change forces animals into new environments where they can encounter diseases they’ve never faced before and to which they’re susceptible.

Even more important is the common root cause of industrialization and human expansion and environmental destruction. Again, forcing more animals together magnifies the impact of communicable diseases, and things like the use of antibiotics to make factory farming as profitable as possible has the inevitable consequences of making diseases that are harder to treat.

[-] masquenox@lemmy.world 11 points 11 months ago

Thanks for the ELI5.

Apart from ingestion, are there any other known methods of transmission as far as prions are concerned?

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[-] rtxn@lemmy.world 23 points 11 months ago

Not this pathogen. Prions are not living organisms, not even as much as viruses, and are extremely resistant to both heat and cold. It's the same stuff that caused the mad cow disease in Britain.

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[-] Chocrates@lemmy.world 33 points 11 months ago

Without reading, is it Chronic wasting? I just checked in on that the other day and the CDC didn't seem to think it was a big deal unless you are in a hotzone.

[-] Buffaloaf@lemmy.world 22 points 11 months ago

Yeah. CWD a big problem but it isn't going to cause a zombie apocalypse like the headline implies.

[-] DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe 23 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Prion diseases can take decades to show symptoms, like with CJD, and are very hard to test for in humans.

It might not be a question of whether it can jump species barriers, but when we will know it did, which is why the CDC can't and won't ring any alarm bells, just advise caution, until it's either too late for individuals or a confirmed non-issue.

There was a study that claimed it had jumped to chimps/monkeys in a testing environment but last I heard it was disputed, but that still leaves the average citizen with plenty of reason to not

Checks notes

Eat a diseased animal.

Source your venison, it should be tested if it's from an affected area but you never can trust suppliers for wild game.

Consider just eating, you know, cow, or only venison from a trusted source.

Preferably the person that shot and had it butchered.

[-] WetBeardHairs@lemmy.ml 15 points 11 months ago

Consider just eating, you know, cow, or only venison from a trusted source.

Preferably the person that shot and had it butchered.

Eat the person who shot the deer? Dang that's some extreme veganism.

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[-] yourNewFavouriteUser@sh.itjust.works 32 points 11 months ago

who had zombie invasion on their 2024 bingo card?

[-] Astronautical@sh.itjust.works 12 points 11 months ago

Honestly, natural disaster/Apocalypse has been on mine since 2021

[-] RickyRigatoni@lemmy.ml 10 points 11 months ago

it's always on my bingo card. i am a very hopeful person.

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[-] BeautifulMind@lemmy.world 32 points 11 months ago

scientists raise fears it may jump to humans

Who says it hasn't? I mean, have you looked at our politics lately?

[-] catsarebadpeople@sh.itjust.works 19 points 11 months ago

POLITICS! Amiright folks?!

[-] Coldgoron@lemmy.world 28 points 11 months ago

Add it to “What else can fuck millennials?” pile.

[-] FaceDeer@kbin.social 24 points 11 months ago

A particularly concerning illness for me.

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[-] otterpop@lemmy.world 22 points 11 months ago

I believe it's made the jump into a certain species of monkey in a lab environment last I knew, but the jump to humans hasn't been seen and isn't a given. This is a clickbait title. If you're hunting game, make sure to get it tested with samples taken at a wildlife check station before consuming and you're likely safe here.

[-] Thekingoflorda@lemmy.world 20 points 11 months ago

I see we are lining up for a great 2024

[-] Cosmicomical@kbin.social 16 points 11 months ago
[-] GeekFTW@kbin.social 13 points 11 months ago

(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻

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[-] Sanctus@lemmy.world 16 points 11 months ago

Prions sounds like a very tiny, evil shrimp

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[-] WhyYesZoidberg@lemmy.world 14 points 11 months ago

Yeah here we go! We all wanted a zombie outbreak and all we got was corona lockdowns. This is more like it! Bring it on!

/s

[-] AnneBonny@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 points 11 months ago

It'd be an improvement for some people.

[-] Mighty@lemmy.world 10 points 11 months ago

One estimate in 2017 suggested humans could be eating up to 15,000 CWD-infected animals a year in the

Yeah, no, eating animals is surely never a bad idea. They compare it to the BSE cases that caused years and years of consequences.

[-] girlfreddy@lemmy.ca 13 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

The biggest problem with BSE was the idjit who decided that grinding up the offal from butchered cattle (even the sick and dead ones) should then be mixed into cattle feed.

It was a self-propagating hot mess that affected multiple nations, including Canada.

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[-] Cyberflunk@lemmy.world 10 points 11 months ago
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this post was submitted on 22 Dec 2023
431 points (100.0% liked)

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