What is bovine spongiform encephalopathy?
Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) is a progressive central nervous system disorder of cattle. It has also been called “mad cow disease”. Cows with BSE may not show signs of the disease for as long as 2 and up to 12 years after being infected. The disease is ultimately fatal within weeks or months after the onset of symptoms. BSE in cattle was first recognised in the UK in November 1986 spreading rapidly through British cattle herds and reaching epidemic proportions. The epidemic reached its peak in 1992 when 36,680 cases were confirmed in that year, and since then has shown a steady decline. BSE belongs to a group of rare, fatal diseases called transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs). The term ‘spongiform encephalopathy’ literally means ‘holes in the brain’. TSEs have been found in humans, sheep, goats, cows, mink, deer, cats and some zoo animals.
Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) is a progressive neurological disorder of cattle that results from infection by an unconventional transmissible agent. Through the end of November 2003, more than 183,000 cases of BSE were confirmed in the United Kingdom alone in more than 35,000 herds. Regularly updated numbers of reported BSE cases, by country, are available on the website of the Office International Des Epizooties at: http://www.oie.int/eng/info/en_esb.htm The BSE epidemic in the United Kingdom peaked in January 1993 at almost 1,000 new cases per week. The outbreak may have resulted from the feeding of scrapie-containing sheep meat-and-bone meal to cattle. There is strong evidence and general agreement that the outbreak was amplified by feeding rendered bovine meat-and-bone meal to young calves. The nature of the transmissible agent is unknown. Currently, the most accepted theory is that the agent is a modified form of a normal cell surface component known as prion protein. The
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) is a progressive, fatal disease of the nervous system of cattle. It is what is known as a transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE). Other TSEs include scrapie in sheep, chronic wasting disease in deer and elk, and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) in humans. Although the exact cause of BSE is unknown, it is associated with the presence of an abnormal protein called a prion. There is no treatment or vaccine currently available for the disease.
