Brazil confirms second case of atypical mad cow disease

a reply to: seeker1963

I think you and I are talking about two different things.

There are significant differences between grass fed beef and feed lot beef (corn finished).

If we are talking about true grass fed beef, then there is no exposure to GMO grain (although they can be given the non grain parts of the plant) as the cow is out to pasture for its entire life before slaughter. At most, it has mineral supplements. So, unless the GMO plant is causing the prion disease and you can prove these cows were getting GMO crop plants in their pasturage, they weren't getting any GMO grain.

There is one other category called pasture-raised where the cattle can be supplemented with grain in a bin along with their life-long open grass access. Maybe these cows were pasture raised, but the reality is that most Brazilian beef is grass fed.

•Feedlot operations are currently a reality for the Brazilian beef cattle industry; nonetheless the beef cattle industry in Brazil is still based on grass-fed animals in which the Nellore breed predominates. At some point this constitutes an important advantage for Brazilian beef exportations because some countries look for “natural beef.”

And because of the rising popularity of natural beef, the majority of Brazilian beef is likely to remain grass fed.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: seeker1963

I think you and I are talking about two different things.

There are significant differences between grass fed beef and feed lot beef (corn finished).

If we are talking about true grass fed beef, then there is no exposure to GMO grain (although they can be given the non grain parts of the plant) as the cow is out to pasture for its entire life before slaughter. At most, it has mineral supplements. So, unless the GMO plant is causing the prion disease and you can prove these cows were getting GMO crop plants in their pasturage, they weren't getting any GMO grain.

There is one other category called pasture-raised where the cattle can be supplemented with grain in a bin along with their life-long open grass access. Maybe these cows were pasture raised, but the reality is that most Brazilian beef is grass fed.

•Feedlot operations are currently a reality for the Brazilian beef cattle industry; nonetheless the beef cattle industry in Brazil is still based on grass-fed animals in which the Nellore breed predominates. At some point this constitutes an important advantage for Brazilian beef exportations because some countries look for “natural beef.”

And because of the rising popularity of natural beef, the majority of Brazilian beef is likely to remain grass fed.

We very well could be!

What I and where I was coming from was that I have been BS'd into someone trying to sell me what they were marketing as "grass fed" beef and as I questioned them they finally admitted that, "well they are grass fed but grain finished"! I learned my lesson and since then caught two other people trying the same deal!

But as another ATS member already mentioned, if they are correct in their research, both you and I are chasing the wrong dragon at this point.

All I want is the truth about all of these problems, and like you I am sure we are both tired of the same canned responses while yet it seems our health problems just get worse, let alone our food supply!

No worries!

a reply to: seeker1963

Honestly, I'm neutral on the GMO thing. I'm not saying they are or they aren't yet. I have yet to be convinced one way or the other. We just avoid as many grains as possible.

Now, if we were talking about a cow in the US, I'd be with you as the odds are that there is every chance it had been fed grain at some point in its life. It's just how we raise livestock here and in most other 1st world countries, but Brazil is in a unique position being 2nd world shading to 3rd in their back country. They still do things the old-fashioned cattle baron wild west way, so they're in a good position to corner the market on natural beef if they stop developing their nascent stocker feeder/feedlot ops where they're at now and go from where they stand.

This happening to them is a real tragedy really. The odds of this cow being fed grain in any steady way if at all are about as good as running across one in the US who's never had it.

But if this had been a US cow with the deer who have free roaming access to poach grain fields, I'd say there is a working hypothesis for someone who wants to test it.

originally posted by: dragonridr
a reply to: seeker1963

Here its not possible for GMOs to cause prions. This protein is restricted to meat which is hight in protein like bone meal for example. There is no grain in the world that can contain prions.

Prions Found in Plants Cause Concern

Prions — the infectious, deformed proteins that cause chronic wasting disease, or CWD, in deer — can be taken up by plants such as alfalfa, corn and tomatoes, according to new research from the National Wildlife Health Center in Madison.

The research further demonstrated that stems and leaves from tainted plants were infectious when injected into laboratory mice.

…“Imagine people, wildlife or livestock eating a cereal or vegetable that could years or decades later cause an incurable, fatal brain disease.

“…There is no other deadly disease agent as bizarre or invisible.”

a reply to: soficrow


Theres no link to the study but im willing to bet the researchers are confusing viroids with prions. We need to find the scientific paper attached to the study unless there isnt one and there making a connection that isnt there. Ill see what i can dig up i have a friend that does research in virology im sure he can give us an answer.

a reply to: boymonkey74

Why did the cows go mad?
Because the pigs plagued them.

originally posted by: dragonridr
a reply to: soficrow


....im willing to bet the researchers are confusing viroids with prions.

I doubt it.

U.S. Geological Survey: Wisconsin Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit 2013 Annual Report

Uptake of Prions Into Plants

Investigators: Joel Pedersen, Department of Soil Science, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Funding: US Geological Survey – National Wildlife Health Center
Expected Completion: June 30, 2016

Transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) are a family of invariably fatal neurodegenerative diseases that afflict a variety of mammalian species. Animal TSEs have been a major concern to food safety since recognition in the 1990s that BSE can transmit to humans through the consumption of infected meat. An additional health concern is CWD, which affects wildlife in the deer family. The risk of CWD to non-cervid species, including other wildlife and humans, is largely unknown. In environments likely to be contaminated with CWD, vegetation is ubiquitous and these plants absorb a variety of substances from soil, ranging from nutrients to contaminants. Recent experiments have confirmed that plants have the capability for uptake of prions. The goals of this project are assess uptake of prions into plant species commonly consumed by deer, measure prion infectivity within various plant tissues, and to determine the mechanism of prion uptake into plants.

ALSO - check out the references in this thread: Prions Found in Plants.

It could be something like a prion reservoir in food sources in plants.


Or it could be a rare protein synthesis problem in the cow themselves. There could be a rare mutation either through genetics or random mutation cows are prone too that increases the risk of proteins being transcribed and created wrong in the ribosomes? All it takes is for one badly folded protein in the form of a prion and the chain reaction of a prion disease is off.

originally posted by: crazyewok
It could be something like a prion reservoir in food sources in plants.


Or it could be a rare protein synthesis problem in the cow themselves. There could be a rare mutation either through genetics or random mutation cows are prone too that increases the risk of proteins being transcribed and created wrong in the ribosomes? All it takes is for one badly folded protein in the form of a prion and the chain reaction of a prion disease is off.

Prions are extremely common in nature - the evidence suggests they are an epigenetic mechanism that allows rapid response to environmental change. Here's a short reading list.

Epigenetics in the extreme: prions and the inheritance of environmentally acquired traits.

Prions are an unusual form of epigenetics: Their stable inheritance and complex phenotypes come about through protein folding rather than nucleic acid-associated changes. With intimate ties to protein homeostasis and a remarkable sensitivity to stress, prions are a robust mechanism that links environmental extremes with the acquisition and inheritance of new traits.
PMID: 21030648

Prion Remains Infectious after Passage through Digestive System of American Crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos)

Avian scavengers, such as American crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos), have potential to translocate infectious agents (prions) of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE) diseases including chronic wasting disease, scrapie, and bovine spongiform encephalopathy. ....this common, migratory North American scavenger could play a role in the geographic spread of TSE diseases.

Quinacrine promotes replication and conformational mutation of chronic wasting disease prions

(Quinacrine is a drug to treat worm infestations, once used to treat malaria)

Three epigenetic information channels and their different roles in evolution.

There is increasing evidence for epigenetically mediated transgenerational inheritance across taxa. However, the evolutionary implications of such alternative mechanisms of inheritance remain unclear. Herein, we show that epigenetic mechanisms can serve two fundamentally different functions in transgenerational inheritance: (i) selection-based effects, which carry adaptive information in virtue of selection over many generations of reliable transmission; and (ii) detection-based effects, which are a transgenerational form of adaptive phenotypic plasticity. The two functions interact differently with a third form of epigenetic information transmission, namely information about cell state transmitted for somatic cell heredity in multicellular organisms. Selection-based epigenetic information is more likely to conflict with somatic cell inheritance than is detection-based epigenetic information. Consequently, the evolutionary implications of epigenetic mechanisms are different for unicellular and multicellular organisms, which underscores the conceptual and empirical importance of distinguishing between these two different forms of transgenerational epigenetic effect.
© 2011 The Authors. Journal of Evolutionary Biology © 2011 European Society For Evolutionary Biology.
PMID: 21504495

a reply to: soficrow

Don't think you got what I was getting at.

It could have been from a external source as you said.

I was just putting a idea forward of maybe a internal origin in the cow itself seeing as it was isolated.

a reply to: crazyewok

Ah. ...I think "isolated" meant not exposed to other animals with BSE, meaning it wasn't "acquired." As I recall, about 85% of prion diseases are "spontaneous" (or "sporadic") - meaning they likely result from an environmental response.

There are three types of CJD: 1) sporadic, also called spontaneous, for which the cause is not known; 2) familial, also called genetic or inherited, which is due to a defect in the prion protein gene; 3) and acquired, which is transmitted by infection due to exposure to the infectious prion from contaminated meat, or from transplant of contaminated tissues or use of contaminated instruments during surgical procedures.

....most cases of human prion disease are sporadic, about 10% are familial (genetically inherited)

NOTE: Evidence suggests prion disease inheritance is epigenetic, not genetic (the DNA is not changed; the prions are inherited independently from genes).

a reply to: soficrow

Well my guess was familial IE some sort of malfunction in the protein synthesis.

a reply to: crazyewok

Definitely not familial - clearly spontaneous "malfunction in the protein synthesis" aka BSE prion formation. The important information is that it was identified as a BSE prion, not some other protein or misfolded form. ...Fact is, many things can cause virtually any protein to misfold in many different ways with diverse effects - so what exact environmental factor does England, Europe and North America have in common with Brazil that acts on exactly the same protein in exactly the same way?

...That's the poser.

a reply to: soficrow

To be spontaneous is doesn't necessarily have to be a environmental factor it could be? Or it could be something within the cow itself IE a issue in protein synthesis.

But its guess work until more data collected.

originally posted by: crazyewok
a reply to: soficrow

To be spontaneous is doesn't necessarily have to be a environmental factor it could be? Or it could be something within the cow itself IE a issue in protein synthesis.

We can define ALL prion diseases as "issues in protein synthesis" that are 1. spontaneous, 2. acquired/infectious OR 3. familial/inherited (either genetically or epigenetically).

"Spontaneous" cases are linked to environmental influences (meaning cellular environment and by implication external environment). The process is well-understood: Gene expression governs protein synthesis, epigenetics governs gene expression, environment governs epigenetic processes.

Edit. Other way around:

Environment governs epigenetic processes, which govern gene expression, which governs protein synthesis.

But its guess work until more data collected.

Not really.



But again, the important question is:

What exact environmental factor is common to England, Europe, North America and Brazil that acts on exactly the same protein in exactly the same way?