A deadly disease that infects deer and turns them practically into real zombies, has been spreading rapidly throughout the US states and Canadian provinces since the end of 2018.
In a new research report, scientists fear that this disease may become infectious for humans.
This is the so-called Chronic wasting disease (CWD) – a form of spongiform encephalopathy (mad cow disease) that affects the brain.
White-tailed deer, moose, caribou are sick, that is, those animals that are very actively hunted and later eaten in the USA and Canada. And often without checking meat from veterinarians.
The diseased animal begins to lose weight and its behavior changes due to brain damage. It becomes aggressive and not afraid of people.
In the past years, this disease was identified in only two states of the United States, and as of January 2019, it has already actively spread to 24 US states and two Canadian provinces.
The fact that in the forests of the United States appeared extremely dangerous chronic debilitating disease, residents were warned a few years ago and already then brought analogies with the epidemic of mad cow disease, fearing that hunters will begin to become infected in large quantities from the meat of sick deer.
At the moment there is no information about the infection of people with this disease, but due to the fact that the epidemic among deer is spreading more and more, most likely such cases will be revealed in the near future, experts fear.
“It is possible that the disease already exists in many other states, but this has simply not been identified,” said a spokesman for the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The diseased animal looks very thin, with protruding ribs, red eyes and a meaningless look. It moves more slowly and looks like a real zombie.
This disease can actually be dangerous for people. Scientists have figured it out after they conducted an experiment with laboratory monkeys, adding infected reindeer meat to their food. Macaques got sick and they had all the symptoms of the disease, like deer.
An experiment was also conducted on mice that were introduced to some human genes. Mice also got infected.
Zombie apocalypse is near?
Is this real thing 😑