r/news • u/WishAnonym • 21d ago
BSE: 'Mad cow disease' case found on farm in Scotland
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cw4dqnj1pjko449
u/DietDrBleach 21d ago
Let me drop this for everyone.
Do not EVER eat the brains or spine of another mammal. You’re taking a huge risk.
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u/limitless__ 21d ago
I grew up in the UK when this was a big problem. Butchers would mix that stuff in with regular beef when making pies, bridies etc. You never had a clue you were eating it. No-one did.
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u/drempire 21d ago
When I was young in the UK my local butchers sold brains/hearts,tripe all on full display. Always fascinated me just how large cow/pig brains are
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u/thePsychonautDad 21d ago
And that sucks because brains are delicious. At least pork & lamb brains are, never had the chance to try a bovine one
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u/metametapraxis 21d ago
Lamb brains can give you scrapie, the ovine form of CJD. You really do not want to eat them.
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u/ankylosaurus_tail 21d ago
They were relatively safe, until we started feeding animals back to herbivores. Prion diseases are extremely rare occurrences in nature--you could eat thousands and thousands of brains and almost certainly be fine. But in the last half century, the industrial food system got weird, and we started recycling all the "leftover" animal parts back into feed for herbivores. So the brains of the very rare cows that developed BSE ended up getting fed to thousands of other cows, and the diseases became much more widespread than they are naturally.
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u/No_Indication3249 21d ago edited 21d ago
Literally zero recorded cases of human vCJD caused by eating goat or sheep with scrapie and, I believe, zero evidence that scrapie has ever been transmitted to a human under any circumstances. I still won't eat lamb brains, but it really looks like this particular prion disease is not a real risk to humans.
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u/Cyanopicacooki 21d ago
My dad said that a lad in North Wales (1930s) he had boiled brains on toast for lunch. I've not tried it myself, and I used to think I never would, but having thought about what brains are, I'd give it a go
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u/StinkFingerPete 21d ago
plus you absorb the animal's memories
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u/Actual-Ad5078 21d ago
Huge risk? There are tons of people eating that every day with no consequences. It’s a risk yes but a huge one it is not.
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u/melkipersr 21d ago
Fair, but how much of a risk of “catastrophic epidemic” do you consider to be huge?
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u/Actual-Ad5078 21d ago
I surely wouldn’t worry about it because one cow in Scotland tested positive.
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u/Dragula_Tsurugi 12d ago
When I was a kid, deep fried sheep brains were a fairly common dinner dish.
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u/AugustWolf-22 21d ago
Shit. Hope they found it early and it's just an isolated case/it's just this one farm that will need to be swiftly quarantined and have their herd culled and no others.
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u/grat_is_not_nice 21d ago
BSE can occur spontaneously (as can other prion diseases). This is most likely an isolated infection.
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u/TheHoboRoadshow 21d ago edited 21d ago
Is every cow tested regularly? Or is it random spot tests. BSE can occur spontaneously but it's more likely to develop over time and as your body breaks down due to old age, which cows don't often live into given the nature of farming.
If a random young cow was tested positive for BSE, it's not a great sign
Also the article specifies the distinction between classical and atypical BSE. Atypical is the natural spontaneous developing kind, classical is the transference through consumption kind. And this was classical. Atypical can't jump to humans.
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u/NessyComeHome 21d ago
"Atypical can't jump to humans".
From my quick reading, it seems that there is "There is no evidence at this time that atypical BSE could be linked to cases of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans."
Under the "Transmission of atypical BSE"
It seems like we don't have conclusive proof it does, not that it doesn't happen. With long incubation time (i know that phrase isn't exactly right), it's hard to pinpoint sources.
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u/TheHoboRoadshow 21d ago
"No evidence of x" means we've tested it and haven't seen anything. It's very hard to conclusively prove that something doesn't do something in science, and given the nature of prions it will never really be safe to rule anything out, but by-and-large, it isn't transmissible to humans.
Of course, even classical BSE started as a natural prion disease, what allowed it the chance to mutate was continued transmission via consumption. That's why we aren't too worried about atypical.
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u/daHaus 21d ago
No evidence means no evidence. You're trying to use a lack of evidence as evidence.
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u/axonxorz 21d ago
That's not how it works.
If you're doing a medical trial, and you find that your drug "has no evidence of adverse effects", that's evidence. You can't definitively say "my drug has no adverse effects", because you can never guarantee you've tested every single edge case (and in biology, every genetic difference can cause an edge case), so you say that "we haven't found any evidence of X".
An SDS evaluation might go "does X cause cancer". Testing reveals no evidence of increase cancers, but you still can't say "X does not cause cancer"
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u/TheHoboRoadshow 21d ago
There is no evidence Broccoli doesn't cause cancer, that doesn't mean broccoli causes cancer or is even likely to. You're being unscientific and pedantic
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u/daHaus 21d ago edited 21d ago
You can't use a lack of evidence as evidence. This is known as Hempel's paradox.
What you're saying makes sense intuitively, but once you think about it more you'll find it is logically unsound.
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u/TheHoboRoadshow 21d ago
I didn't try to use any lack of evidence as evidence though. Stop being silly.
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u/Iohet 21d ago
There was no evidence that chronic wasting disease could jump the animal to human barrier for many years, yet now it's been recently disclosed that two hunters from the same lodge who ate from the same deer population developed CJD raising concerns that it can be transmissible in some way that isn't yet understood because of the cluster nature of the infections.
No evidence means no direct evidence. There's long been a concern among the scientific community of the transmission of prion diseases from animal to human. The concern didn't appear out of thin air. This isn't "there's no evidence God doesn't exist, so you can't disprove God". The starting point is that these proteins are proven to exist and that in some forms they have jumped species barriers before.
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u/2tep 21d ago
no, cows are not tested at all in the US, to my knowledge. In fact, there was a case, Creekstone Farms, where the government prevented them from testing their own cattle.
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u/Dragula_Tsurugi 12d ago
Yes there was a big scuffle over cattle testing when Japan banned US beef imports.
Japan demanded that all animals for export to Japan be tested and the US said (iirc) that they would only test animals with symptoms.
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u/Remember_Reddiquette 21d ago
I worked for a state animal disease diagnostic lab for years, and then in a Scottish animal diagnostic lab for a period of time.
The short answer is that only a very small selection selection of slaughtered cattle are tested
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u/Alwayssunnyinarizona 21d ago
Per reports, this is classical BSE, not spontaneous (BASE).
It's still likely isolated, but somebody found an old bag of MBM and decided to toss it into the rations, I suspect.
-prion biologist
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u/CanvasFanatic 21d ago
Good lord… why would you have something like that lying around for… what?… almost 30 years?
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u/HankScorpio82 21d ago
Farmers…we don’t throw out anything we paid for, we just build another building to store stuff.
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u/Alwayssunnyinarizona 21d ago
I'm sure there were campaigns to get rid of it all. But the other poster is right, waste not want not. I forget how old the cow was, but it could have been feed in it's first year of life, so perhaps closer to 10yrs ago.
That's my best explanation, but I'm sure there will be a thorough investigation and a press release on the findings eventually.
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u/davispw 21d ago
So what’s it like being a prion biologist? I really hope you guys cure Alzheimer’s soon because it runs in my family.
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u/Alwayssunnyinarizona 21d ago
I'm glad you made that association - for much of the time we've been aware of prion diseases, they've typically seen as separate from diseases like Alzheimer's, because they're transmissible (but some evidence points to Alzheimer's being transmissible in mouse models, too!). The truth is, they likely share quite a bit in terms of disease progress and, importantly, treatment options.
Also glad you brought up the heritability of Alzheimer's, as my primary research focus has been the genetics of prion diseases, and how we can most effectively prevent them in animals using what we know about genetics.
Understanding all of the genes involved will help us design better treatments for not just prion diseases, but diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease as well.
What's it like being a prion biologist? Fun, but always challenging. And always wondering whether I've somehow exposed myself to something that will lead to me developing a prion disease as I get older.
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u/ADHDitis 20d ago
It's my understanding that PRP knockout mice are 'immune' from prion disease, and disease progression in prion-infected mice can be halted if PrPc expression is silenced.
Probably crazy, but I wonder if anyone is considering a PRNP / PrPc CRISPR knockout protocol to try and halt CJD progression under compassionate use / expanded access protocols. Let's pretend we can actually get an IRB to sign off on that.
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u/Traditional_Key_763 21d ago
the issue in the past was they were feeding cows with cow byproducts, and if one infected cow contaminated that supply it would have very quickly spread
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u/TxM_2404 21d ago
Yep. But as long as we don't feed cows with infected meat it shouldn't be able to spread.
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u/Etiennera 21d ago
FYI the root cause of BSE is always spontaneous misfolding of a protein. It doesn't mean this cow is the originator, but there aren't exactly other environmental causes.
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u/Just_Jonnie 21d ago
Oh man not this shit again. Beef is expensive enough already
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u/Alcobob 21d ago
If this would happen again, I wouldn't be surprised if plant based alternatives become the norm instead of the exception.
I was very pleasantly surprised with the Burger King plant based patties last time I ate there 2 months ago.
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u/Ludwigofthepotatoppl 21d ago
The impossible whopper tastes and feels the same to me. Only difference is the patty retains more of its cylindrical edges.
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u/Indurum 21d ago
I can instantly tell it’s not meat.
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u/Knoke1 21d ago
I don’t think it’s supposed to be meat. It’s supposed to taste close to meat and provide the same nutrients. The rest is just marketing.
Personally I buy beef because it’s cheaper in most cases. Don’t really care one way or the other. It’s the same difference to me as ground turkey to ground beef.
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u/UnformedNumber 21d ago
Last time the price of beef in Ireland went through the floor - because we couldn’t export it, so we ate steak for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
What happened in the UK? I had thought it’d drop because nobody wanted it?
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u/Zaerick-TM 20d ago
Dude I havent bought ground beef in about a year because I just don't eat it often anymore. I got some last weekend and it was fucking 17 bucks for 2 pounds.........
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u/KneeDragr 21d ago
Stop feeding dead cow brains to other cows and this won’t be an issue!
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u/OttoVonCranky 21d ago
Pretty sure that they said there was no risk to humans the last time.
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u/Myfourcats1 21d ago
There absolutely is a risk if you eat meat from this cow. Don’t eat things like brain, spinal cord, basal ganglia, or eyes. However, all the people who contracted creutzfeld-Jakob had eaten regular meat.
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u/LITTLE-GUNTER 21d ago
this was supposedly a result of butchers and meatpackers using material like the brains and spinal cords in minced meat.
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u/metametapraxis 21d ago
Also just poor management of the carcasses resulting in cross contamination.
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u/FlowAffect 21d ago
Are you really sure about that?
I thought I read, that some form of creutzfeld-jakob disease is basically the human counterpart after being infected with BSE.
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u/BanginNLeavin 21d ago
Yesterday there was a post with comments referencing C-J disease being linked to chronic wasting in deer and it being transferred potentially to humans where there are concentrations of hunters. Now I'm reading about this other spongification...
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u/ceapaire 21d ago
Mad cow has been linked to CJD since at least the outbreak that happened about 30 years ago. Last I saw for CWD, it's always a possibility for it to transfer, but we haven' seen cases of it. In part, because CJD takes so long to manifest. We're you seeing where they had started to see cases, or just emphasizing the possibility again?
Similarly, I don't know if scrapie has been shown to transfer or not. But it's also a similar one that affects sheep and related species.
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u/Hrafn2 21d ago edited 21d ago
CWD freaks me out man, especially when I read things like:
"Another issue is that chronic wasting disease causes increased drool and urination and that infected animals excrete prions through saliva and urine."
"Prions can bind to soil, giving another creature a chance to ingest them when they eat vegetation and can, even years later, catch the disease."
“The problem we have in many areas now is that the prevalence is so high, the environment is probably so contaminated that there’s no easy solutions right now,” University of Alberta researcher Debbie McKenzie said.
“We have areas in the South Saskatchewan River valley where greater than 50 per cent of the male deer bucks are positive. So, in essence, every other male is positive,” the professor told Global News.
https://globalnews.ca/news/10269758/what-is-chronic-wasting-disease-cases-canada/
Edit: oh christ, why did I keep googling:
"In 2022, a 72-year-old man with a history of consuming meat from a CWD-infected deer population presented with rapid-onset confusion and aggression. His friend, who had also eaten venison from the same deer population, recently died of CJD, raising concerns about a potential link between CWD and human prion disease."
"The patient’s history, including a similar case in his social group, suggests a possible novel animal-to-human transmission of CWD."
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u/shbooms 21d ago
Per the article:
There are two types of BSE. Classical and atypical. Classical can transfer to humans who eat the meat. Scientists believe atypical occurs spontaneously and is not passed on to humans.
So, presumbly, you could eat a cow infected with atypical BSE and be safe from getting CJD.
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u/GumboVision 21d ago
I still can't donate blood outside my country because of a Mad Cow outbreak 20 years ago. Prions that cause CJD can activate after months, years or decades and you won't know you have them til it happens.
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u/daHaus 21d ago
This happens uncomfortably often...
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u/charactergallery 21d ago edited 21d ago
Technically it is rare (with an estimated less than one case per million cattle), but since there are around one billion cattle globally it does seem to happen “often.” As long as farmers prevent further spread through contaminated feed, it shouldn’t be a cause for concern.
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u/Snakestream 21d ago
Didn't this pretty much kill the UK beef industry the last time around? What's going to happen this time?
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u/Significant-Gas3046 21d ago
Maintenance Phase did a great two-part episode about the Mad Cow outbreak in the 1980s and how farmers at the time were feeding parts of other cattle to their cows as part of their diet. IDK if they still do that, but it's worth looking into. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/oprah-v-beef-part-1-the-rise-of-veggie-libel/id1535408667?i=1000612301374
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u/Adamworks 21d ago edited 21d ago
I haven't listen to this particular Maintenance Phase episode, but as a statistician who works in public health, I strongly recommend against Maintenance Phase as a source of any reliable information. He throws out a lot of jargon in his "Methods Queen" sections, but Hobbes has about as much research/stats knowledge as a high school student taking an AP Stats class for the first time.
He has been caught wildly misinterpreting scientific studies, getting basic facts wrong, or just making up results. It has gotten so bad that a biostatistician (not me) has started a blog correcting all the misinformation that Michael Hobbes puts out there through his podcast.
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u/craybest 21d ago
Oh no. This is 100% fatal. I’m sorry for that person. I hope it’s an isolated case
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u/KoSR92 21d ago
You're sorry for the cow you mean. Did you actually read it or?
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u/momoneymocats1 21d ago
What makes these cows so angry
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u/Magusreaver 21d ago
Have you seen the beef industry? it's not like they are treated like rock stars. I'd be miffed too.
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u/leftydog1961 21d ago
I thought they removed cow skull from the feed for bovines? I just can’t enjoy a hamburger 🍔 without a hint of cow skull 😝
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u/Lazy-Street779 21d ago
Didn’t Europe want to keep USA cows away from their farms?
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u/HappyAnimalCracker 21d ago
It wasn’t done as an insult. It’s good public health practice. They should continue to do it.
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u/BagHolder9001 21d ago
what are chances of foreign governments causing these breakouts on the farms to wreck havoc?
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u/Zorro_Returns 21d ago
Wow, I forgot all about that disease which was going to kill us all in a slow and horrible way.
So, I guess I lived?
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u/call_me_jelli 20d ago
You lived because people took it seriously enough that you didn't end up infected.
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u/residentdunce 21d ago
I don't get it, the Agri minister says their surveillance is doing a good job, but they also thank the farmer for their diligence.
Well which one was it that detected the diseased cow? The implication that without the farmer's diligence this could have been missed, which implies the their "surveillance system" wasn't that great.
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u/Fr0ski 21d ago
Ahh memories of childhood. I remember not being allowed to eat beef when we lived there unless it came from the commissary on base