4 ms·
OTOH, possibly the oldest known prion disease is scrapie, which has been known in sheep for centuries. Scrapie, unlike BSE, does not appear to be communicable t
by GlenTheMachine 8y ago
OTOH, possibly the oldest known prion disease is scrapie, which has been known in sheep for centuries. Scrapie, unlike BSE, does not appear to be communicable to humans. But: susceptibility to scrapie is highly genetic and easily tested for. Most shepherds in the US are doing genetic testing and selecting specifically for genetic immunity in their flocks. My own flock is about 75% fully immune, with the remainders having one of the two genes needed, which makes them highly resistant but not completely immune.
To me this seems indicative that there could well be pharmaceutical treatments for prion disease. They just haven’t been a big enough problem to really address yet.
It also may indicate that genetic resistance could quickly spread through deer populations once the disease starts exerting enough evolutionary pressure.
- awakeasleep 8y agoThe disease will never exert strong evolutionary pressure as the symptoms start appearing well after deer will have reproduced.
- GlenTheMachine 8y agoNo, the disease starts exhibiting symptoms after 2-3 years. Deer average five years and can live for up to ten years in the wild, and are reproductively active that entire time. So there is definitely some evolutionary pressure; a deer infected at age 1 year would be expected, on average, to have less than half the offspring of a healthy deer.
- Fomite 8y agoThere's also the very real question of "Is there a non-deleterious mutation that confers resistance?"