Thoughts on Eatable CWD Deer??

[Walkingeagle]

Ok, got a nice mullie this year in early November, quite a decent 5x4 meat buck. Large body and very healthy looking. This was taken in a mandatory CWD head submission area, and my results just came back positive. I process all my own meat, boneless with the only exception being ribs. My understanding is there has never been a confirmed case of a transfer to humans. With a positive test comes a choice of eating or properly disposing of the meat. CWD is not nearly as common up here as it is in many states, so I ask. Do you worry about eating it?
Walk

 

[appalichian hunter]

If you did not expose the spinal cord or brain to the other portions of the harvest and was very particular as to cleanliness of the area you processed your deer you should be o.k., Also the area I hunt in Maryland is considered a C.W.D. area, I also process all my own harvested animals , as I butcher them I will bone all the edible parts and never cut a bone as to expose the marrow. The best thing to do is contact your local D.N.R. officer they should be able to give you further information. Once finished with the butchering I completely wash very well all the tools grinder, stuffer,knives etc. used in the process with very hot soapy water and rinse with a hot water and Clorox rinse, air dry before putting the tools up. This has worked well for the last 25 years I have a small butcher shop with all stainless steel benches and am very particular as to cleaning.

 

[QuinnTheEskimo]

I would not eat venison from a known CWD infected deer.

 

[SDSmlf]

My understanding is there has never been a confirmed case of a transfer to humans.

If it is confirmed that it does transfer to humans do you want to the the first case?

If a package of meat in a store was labeled ‘CWD Positive’ would you purchase it for you and your family?

 

[sawyer04]

I am not an expert, by no means, but the advice I will give. "If in doubt, don't consume the meat". CWD is said to be in the brain and spinal cord. However, the muscle tissue of any living thing is the filter system for the body.

 

[Hammond79]

Might sound trite, but much better safe than sorry.

 

[Zonie]

Here is an interesting link to an article dealing with CWD experiments.

https://www.cdc.gov/prions/cwd/transmission.html

It seems CWD can be transmitted to some less human like monkeys but a more human like monkey did not contract the disease unless the contaminated brain tissue was placed directly into the monkey's brain.

 

[Rifleman1776]

Lot of good info posted so far, especially by ah. Here in Arkansas the same advice is to not expose spinal cord or brain. Otherwise muscle meat is OK to eat.

 

[poker]

I might eat it myself, but wouldn’t feed it to anybody else for sure. Can you imagine if somehow they were diagnosed with something like crutzfeldt jakob disease? It’d be devastating. And I have heard and talked to people who claim there is a link.

 

[Sparkitoff]

I want to know what the game law say regarding disposal of meat. In one State, "wanton waste" is when you fail to attempt to preserve and utilize the meat from the animal". In another it says "meat that is left in the field … or otherwise disposed of without regard to consumption". If the live animal said, " I have CWD" on it, could you shoot it and take the hide/antlers but leave the meat? What if you take home meat from what was a perfectly healthy deer but once home you throw it all away? What if you give it to the dog or use it for fertilizer? Is that a "proper utilization"? I personally wouldn't eat it. I just have no reason to. I can afford to buy meat and/or shoot something else. I am not interested in gambling with my health or anyone else's. There's enough junk in store-bought meat that it is killing us already. Is the State going to give you another deer tag since yours is "bad"? I have a lot of questions about diseased deer and the law but nonetheless I wouldn't eat it.

 

[QuinnTheEskimo]

I want to know what the game law say regarding disposal of meat. In one State, "wanton waste" is when you fail to attempt to preserve and utilize the meat from the animal". In another it says "meat that is left in the field … or otherwise disposed of without regard to consumption". If the live animal said, " I have CWD" on it, could you shoot it and take the hide/antlers but leave the meat? What if you take home meat from what was a perfectly healthy deer but once home you throw it all away? What if you give it to the dog or use it for fertilizer? Is that a "proper utilization"? I personally wouldn't eat it. I just have no reason to. I can afford to buy meat and/or shoot something else. I am not interested in gambling with my health or anyone else's. There's enough junk in store-bought meat that it is killing us already. Is the State going to give you another deer tag since yours is "bad"? I have a lot of questions about diseased deer and the law but nonetheless I wouldn't eat it.

Wanton waste laws vary widely by state, the state of VT doesn’t even have one. There are also Federal wanton waste laws in regards to migratory birds.

 

[poker]

By having wanton waste laws, is the state claiming ownership of the animal, its end use, and all in between? If they are, then why dont they guarantee their product? Maybe they should pay Walkingeagle for his expenses and lost meat. Maybe they should be paying vehicle damages when one of their animals collides with a car? They make damn sure a farmer is reponsible if their cow gets on the road and hit. Just sayin.

 

[Kansas Jake]

"Abstract
Chronic wasting disease (CWD) of deer and elk is endemic in a tri-corner area of Colorado, Wyoming, and Nebraska, and new foci of CWD have been detected in other parts of the United States. Although detection in some areas may be related to increased surveillance, introduction of CWD due to translocation or natural migration of animals may account for some new foci of infection. Increasing spread of CWD has raised concerns about the potential for increasing human exposure to the CWD agent. The foodborne transmission of bovine spongiform encephalopathy to humans indicates that the species barrier may not completely protect humans from animal prion diseases. Conversion of human prion protein by CWD-associated prions has been demonstrated in an in vitro cell-free experiment, but limited investigations have not identified strong evidence for CWD transmission to humans. More epidemiologic and laboratory studies are needed to monitor the possibility of such transmissions."

The above is from an article on the CDC website. Prions are not destroyed by cooking and I'm not sure about cleaning. Another issue from what I've read is it may not show up for a number of years after the fact. As much as I would want to keep the meat of a deer or elk I had harvested, I don't think I would risk eating it or feeding it to my family or pets.

 

[Spikebuck]

In Minnesota we are dealing with CWD outbreaks. The Minnesota DNR does not recommend eating the meat from a positively infected deer and neither does the CDC or the WHO. Personally, I would not eat it or feed it to anything else.

Here's the statement from our DNR's CWD website:

Currently, there is no evidence that CWD poses a risk for humans; however, public health officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommend that hunters do not consume meat from animals known to be infected. More information is available from the CDC at www.cdc.gov/prions/cwd.

• Consider having your deer processed and wrapped individually, either privately or commercially.
• Consider having your deer tested if you are outside of DNR’s mandatory sampling framework. Although CWD testing is not a food safety test it could indicate if your deer is infected.
• All deer that are tested should either be processed or stored in a manner to prevent wanton waste while waiting for test results.
• It is the hunter’s choice to consume venison prior to receiving test results.
• The prions that cause CWD are very resistant to heat and freezing temperatures. Cooking or freezing the meat will not remove prions from any infected meat.

 

[Spikebuck]

CWD is said to be in the brain and spinal cord. However, the muscle tissue of any living thing is the filter system for the body.

It's proven to be in an infected animal's feces, urine, and other bodily fluids like saliva and blood. If it's in the blood, it has to be in the meat.

This, in my opinion, is one reason why it's spreading all over and starting in pockets of the country no where near another infection site....people are buying deer scents that are coming from infected farms and spreading them around therefore spreading the disease. In Minnesota, nearly every new outbreak area has been next to a deer farm that was found to be heavily infected. These deer farms were still producing products. While the local outbreak probably occurred because these farms did not properly maintain their fences therefore letting some infected deer to escape and/or wild deer entrance to be in contact with their infected domestic deer, the farm's products may have been distributed to God knows where before the infection was found. Remember, this disease is not evident in an animal for a year or more, so producers could merrily go along bottling up what is essentially poison to spread the disease.

Frankly, if I had my way, the deer scent industry would be shut down nationwide. Either that or there would need to be 100% testing on every "batch" of fluids going into those expensive bottles of attractants.

From the MN DNR Website:

CWD is spread through both direct (animal-to-animal) and indirect (environmental) contact of infected deer to healthy deer. CWD-infected deer can infect a healthy deer through:

• Infected saliva, urine, blood, feces, and antler velvet.
• Infected carcasses left on the ground produce vegetation that attracts deer, where they pick up the prion from plants.
• Artificial feeding sites, or attractants such as salt licks and scents. These sites concentrate deer and create an environment of close contact among animals.

 

[Gun Tramp]

With a positive test comes a choice of eating or properly disposing of the meat.

So just how does one properly dispose of the meat?

 

[Spikebuck]

Gun Tramp, that's a great question. In Minnesota, during the normal firearms season, the DNR is providing special dumpsters stationed around the CWD hunting zones for all carcasses or disposal of infected deer. Now...what they do after that I don't know. Just to give you an idea of how resistant these prions are, here's more info I've found:

In general, prions are quite resistant to proteases, heat, ionizing radiation, and formaldehyde treatments, although their infectivity can be reduced by such treatments. Effective prion decontamination relies upon protein hydrolysis or reduction or destruction of protein tertiary structure.

Prions cannot be destroyed by boiling, alcohol, acid, standard autoclaving methods or radiation, he said. ... Right now it is not clear what it takes to destroy prions, Moench said, but tests have shown some types may survive cremation temperatures of 2,000 degrees.

On one infected elk farm about 20 miles from me, after they destroyed the entire herd...at taxpayer expense...they proceeded to remove 6" to 10" of soil off the entire farm that was hauled away to some facility for decontamination. BTW...that was all at taxpayer expense as well. I don't even want to imagine what that cost.

Get the picture why these deer farms are getting under my skin??? All this so some hunter can put some urine on the ground to attract a deer or some guy in China can consume some dried antler velvet in lieu of a Viagra pill??? Considering the effects on our wild animal populations, the long-terms effects this is and will continue to have on our hunting, and all the cost, I just don't know how deer farms can be justified anymore. The risk/reward balance is now way out of proportion.

 

[Walkingeagle]

Ok, more info to help answer a few questions, followed by a few more questions of my own.
In regards to the laws, please remember I live in Alberta, Canada, and as was previously stated the laws vary by state bit also by country and province as in our case. Here in Alberta it is unlawful to allow the edible meat from any game animal to be wasted, destroyed, spoiled or otherwise made unfit for human consumption (in other words, you cant feed your dogs or pigs with it.) With a positive CWD test result the option is mine to eat or not. If I choose not I must bury, burn or dump in an approved sanitary landfill. There is no tag reimbursement and the season is now closed regardless. I did talk to the biologist who sent the email and got lots of information, including that Health Canada advises against the consumption (same as all other health organizations) even with no evidence of transmission to humans. What else could they say in this litigious world of ours? I did find out that it is estimated at 20,000 deer are harvested from the mandatory WMU’s for CWD testing, but only 9,000 heads are submitted. Roughly 47% compliance, with an infection rate of about 20% overall. That math means about 3600 families are eating contaminated deer unknowingly each year!
So... how many of you in the areas where CWD exist get tested? How many await the results prior to consumption? Or, is ignorance bliss?
Walk

 

[Gun Tramp]

Thank you, gentlemen.

 

[Patocazador]

There are NO confirmed cases of CWD in Florida .. yet. However, I never eat anything involved with the CNS (central nervous system) in any animal or bird. The prions can be transmitted to humans and I don't want to be the 'poster boy' for the first fatality.

Don't eat it is my suggestion.