CWD/Prion News

• CWD-positive white-tailed deer found in Junction City hunting preserve published on Oct 10, 2008
  CWD-positive white-tailed deer found in Junction City hunting preserveContact: Donna Gilson608-224-5130MADISON -- A white-tailed deer on a Portage County hunting preserve has tested positive for chronic wasting disease, State Veterinarian Dr. Robert Ehlenfeldt announced today. The National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Ames, Iowa, reported the test results Thursday, Oct. 9. The animal was a 7-year-old doe owned by Alligator Creek Whitetails LLC and was one of about 150 deer in the preserve. The 119-acre preserve near Junction City in the Town of Eau Pleine in Portage County. The deer was killed on Sept. 20. The Animal Health Division of the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection's investigation will look at the animal's history and trace movements of deer onto and off the property to find out whether other herds may have been exposed to CWD. Deer herds on hunting preserves are generally not on the state's CWD monitoring program. However, Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection rules require that all farm-raised deer and elk 16 months or older must be tested when they die, go to slaughter or are killed. Ehlenfeldt quarantined the Alligator Creek herd immediately. The quarantine stops movement of live deer off or onto the property without written permission from the department. The business will be allowed to conduct hunts through Jan. 15, because properly handled dead animals leaving the premises do not pose a disease risk. Hunters must be notified of the quarantine and the reason for it. This is the first new CWD-infected herd on a Wisconsin farm since January 2005. To date, 97 farm-raised animals in Wisconsin have tested positive for CWD on eight farms and hunting preserves, including 82 on a single Portage County operation. One of the infected animals was an elk; the rest have been white-tailed deer. To date, more than 21,500 farm-raised deer and elk have been tested.
• Live CWD test in elk shows promise published on Jul 07, 2008
  Researchers in May completed their third year of evaluating and validating the first live rectal-tissue biopsy method for detecting chronic wasting disease in captive and wild elk.
• Prions' great escape published on Jul 01, 2008
  Prions, the infective particles behind diseases such as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), can breach standard sewage treatment methods, new research shows.
• Chronic wasting disease under the microscope of researchers published on Jun 06, 2008
  Researchers from the Alberta Prion Institute have been studying wild populations of deer to learn more about chronic wasting disease and its control in the province
• USDA AND COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY RESEARCHERS DEVELOP FIRST LIVE TEST FOR CHRONIC WASTING DISEASE IN ELK published on May 30, 2008
  Researchers from the U.S. Department of Agricultures Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) and Colorado State University (CSU) recently completed their third year of evaluating and validating the first live rectal-tissue biopsy method for detecting chronic wasting disease (CWD) in captive and wild elk. To date, researchers have collected over 1,500 biopsies from captive elk in Colorado and used the technique to find 15 elk that were positive for CWD. As compared to proven post-mortem diagnostic tests, this live test appears to be nearly as accurate
• First-ever case of Chronic Wasting Disease in wild elk found in Saskatchewan published on May 15, 2008
  The first-ever cases of chronic wasting disease (CWD) in wild elk have been discovered in Saskatchewan, but the provincial government hasn't been very public about it.The animals were found dead west of Nipawin in early April, close to Fort a la Corne in the province's east-central region.
• Chronic wasting disease surfaces in Hampshire published on May 09, 2008
  ROMNEY - Test results have detected the chronic wasting disease agent in 11 white-tailed deer collected this spring in Hampshire County, according to the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources.These collections have been designed to investigate and determine the prevalence and distribution of the disease in Hampshire County. Wildlife biologists are carefully monitoring changes in the structure of the deer herd within the CWD containment area.
• Board OKs plan for CWD management published on Apr 24, 2008
  Members of the state Natural Resources Board approved a framework for chronic wasting disease (CWD) management during the 2008 deer hunting season today, while stressing that they ultimately want a comprehensive new statewide plan for controlling the fatal nervous system disease.
• High titers of mucosal and systemic anti-PrP antibodies abrogate oral prion infection in mucosal-vaccinated mice published on Apr 22, 2008
  Significant outbreaks of prion disease linked to oral exposure of the prion agent have occurred in animal and human populations. These disorders are associated with a conformational change of a normal protein, PrPC (C for cellular), to a toxic and infectious form, PrPSc (Sc for scrapie). None of the prionoses currently have an effective treatment. Some forms of prion disease are thought to be spread by oral ingestion of PrPSc, such as chronic wasting disease and variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. Attempts to obtain an active immunization in wild-type animals have been hampered by auto-tolerance to PrP and potential toxicity. Previously, we demonstrated that it is possible to overcome tolerance and obtain a specific anti-PrP antibody response by oral inoculation of the PrP protein expressed in an attenuated Salmonella vector. This past study showed that 30% of vaccinated animals were free of disease more than 350 days post-challenge. In the current study we have both optimized the vaccination protocol and divided the vaccinated mice into low and high immune responder groups prior to oral challenge with PrPSc scrapie strain 139A. These methodological refinements led to a significantly improved therapeutic response. 100% of mice with a high mucosal anti-PrP titer immunoglobulin (Ig) A and a high systemic IgG titer, prior to challenge, remained without symptoms of PrP infection at 400 days (log-rank test P0.0001 versus sham controls). The brains from these surviving clinically asymptomatic mice were free of PrPSc infection by Western blot and histological examination. These promising findings suggest that effective mucosal vaccination is a feasible and useful method for overcoming tolerance to PrP and preventing prion infection via an oral rout
• Report: Recreational hunting alone will not control CWD published on Apr 09, 2008
  Report outlining that hunting alone cannot control CWD in WI and that effective CWD management will require dramatic and sustained efforts.
• West Virginia: Four Additional Deer Test Positive for Chronic Wasting Disease In Hampshire County, West Virginia published on Apr 04, 2008
  West Virginia continues efforts to define prevalence and distribution of CWD.
• British Researchers Discover New Variant of CJD published on Apr 01, 2008
  A case of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease in Britain changes predictions of future infection rates.
• CWD Update #90 - Bryan J. Richards, USGS National Wildlife Health Center. published on Mar 07, 2008
  Regional and State updates on CWD occurances and news.
• Susceptibility of Cattle to First-passage Intracerebral Inoculation with Chronic Wasting Disease Agent from White-tailed Deer published on Mar 01, 2008
  Fourteen, 3-month-old calves were intracerebrally inoculated with the agent of chronic wasting disease (CWD) from white-tailed deer (CWDwtd) to compare the clinical signs and neuropathologic findings with those of certain other transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSE, prion diseases) that have been shown to be experimentally transmissible to cattle (sheep scrapie, CWD of mule deer CWDmd, bovine spongiform encephalopathy BSE, and transmissible mink encephalopathy).