Innovation Anthology #271:
Hunters play a key role in Alberta’s surveillance of Chronic Wasting Disease.
That’s by turning in the heads of whitetail and mule deer they shoot along the Alberta-Saskatchewan border.
The misfolded prions that cause CWD are found in the lymph nodes and brains of infected deer heads.
Provincial wildlife disease specialist Dr. Margo Pybus explains the program.
DR. MARGO PYBUS: What we’ve done this year is we’ve expanded the area so that it’s coming that much further into Alberta because we’re trying to lay a foundation for, if the disease doesn’t occur in these areas now and then if the disease continues to expand, is it going to show up in a broader area? And that’s why we’ve expanded the mandatory zone so that we can get some baseline data, hopefully before the disease is in these areas. And then if it spreads into those areas, we’ll know exactly when it got there.
According to Dr Pybus, hunters can drop off their deer heads at 36 collection points in small towns throughout the surveillance region. Freezers are available 24 hours a day complete with bags and tags.
Thanks today to the Canadian Institutes for Health Research
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I’M CHERYL CROUCHER
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Program Date: 2009-11-26