State Suspends Active Shooting of Deer for CWD Testing
Posted 2018-07-11T15:04:00Z
Have They Been Testing Near You?
The Clarion Ledger in Mississippi recently reported that according to the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, active shooting of whitetails for CWD testing has been suspended.
MDWFP official Russ Walsh addressed the issue.
"For right now, yes, we have ceased active shooting operations," said Russ Walsh, MDWFP Wildlife Bureau executive director. "Response operation samples as of June 19 were 481."
Testing began not long after a 4½-year-old buck tested positive in Issaquena County. All deer killed for testing since then have been within a 25-mile radius of where that whitetail was located. A total of 1,800 have been tested since last October. No other positive cases have been found.
Click here to read the full report.
For those wondering, the only way to get an idea of the current prevalence rate is to test deer. There is currently no approved live test and therefore deer must be killed in order to test them.
Many people aren't aware of CWD, or simply don't understand the full breadth of the threat it poses. CWD is caused by an abnormal protein referred to as a prion. Prions are neither alive nor dead. You can't kill CWD with heat or chemicals.
Once contracted, it is an always-fatal disease that thrives in the nervous system of cervids (deer, elk, reindeer and moose). It can be passed on through saliva, urine, feces, spinal and brain fluids, etc. Similar diseases affect other animals such as Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) which is also referred to as Mad Cow Disease. It's also found in sheep, known as Scrapie. Interestingly enough, we already know that Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) — a sister disease to BSE and CWD — is capable of infecting humans.
Click here to learn more about CWD and how it's actually much worse than we previously thought.
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