Mad cow disease can be transfered from one animal to another

17 June, 2012

Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) is commonly known as 'Mad cow disease'. It is an infectious disease, which affects the brain of the cow. This disease makes the cow to act differently. Mad cow disease is caused by unusual contagious agents called prions. The prions are infected proteins that are similar to a virus, but the only difference is that they are not alive, so you cannot use disinfectants to kill them.

MAD COW disease first appeared in cow in Great Britain in 1985, and was recognized as an infectious disease in 1986, as reported in Beef Myths. This disease can be transferred from one animal to another, if the feed remnants of one cow is consumed by another cow.

The brain tissue of the diseased cow consists of abnormal proteins called prions, these proteins help in transmitting the diseases. Many symptomatic changes are seen in the brain of the diseased cattle such as tiny holes in some parts of the brain, giving it a sponge-like appearance. These holes progressively cause deterioration of the brain and slowly other symptoms appears in the whole body and the death follows.

Mad cow disease symptoms may develop slowly, as the incubation period of the disease is two to eight years and the cow may get fully infected when it first shows the symptoms. The mad cow disease symptoms may include uncoordinated movements, change in attitude and behavior, weight loss inspite of taking proper appetite, producing less amount of milk and facing trouble while standing or walking.

Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (VCJD) is the name given to the mad cow disease in humans, it was named after the researcher Creutzfeldt-Jakob, who was successful in identifying the first classic condition of the disease. This disease is transmitted to humans if they eat the tissue of the cattle which was infected with BSE. This disease in its classic form occurs to older people while the type which is caused by eating infected cattle occurs in younger individuals. The symptoms of VCJD in humans includes ataxia, dementia (loss of memory and confusion), myoclonus, muscle spasm and lack of muscle control, reported emedicinehealth.

There is no known treatment for Mad cow disease, research is being done to find the possible drugs to treat the disease in cattle's and humans. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration gave the approval to the university in California to test the drugs on humans. The drugs which are being tested are Quinacrine (drug used to treat malaria) and Chlorpromazin (drug used to treat schizophrenia).