What is Prion disease? Can 'Zombie Deer disease' affect humans? What are its symptoms?
The prions cause changes in the hosts’ brains and nervous systems, leaving animals drooling, lethargic, emaciated, stumbling and with a telltale “blank stare” that led some to call it “zombie deer disease”.
 )
FollowScientists are concerned about a ‘zombie deer disease’ aka the Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) spread through the development of prion. Last month, tests on a deer corpse discovered in Wyoming's Yellowstone National Park revealed it was positive for the prion illness.
A different kind of protein called prion causes the usually healthy brain proteins to fold improperly. It might lead to illnesses in both people and animals. It is possible for people to get these extremely infectious illnesses by eating contaminated meat.
For years, chronic wasting disease (CWD), caused by prions – abnormal, transmissible pathogenic agents – has been spreading stealthily across North America, with concerns voiced primarily by hunters after spotting deer behaving strangely.
Some of the common symptoms of prion diseases are rapidly developing dementia, hallucinations, difficulty walking and speaking, confusion, fatigue, and muscle stiffness.
The deer population in North America is being quickly affected by the prion disease. Because of a symptom that causes the deer to move like zombies, researchers named it the "zombie deer disease." The discovery of its first case at Yellowstone last month raised concerns among researchers that the fatal disease may spread to humans someday.
According to the reports, lethargy, stumbling, weight loss, and other neurological symptoms are caused by this kind of prion disease. Both the deer's fear of people and their relationships with other animals decrease as a result. Deer, reindeer, moose, and elk in North America, Norway, Canada, and South Korea have been shown to have this prion disease.
