

The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission says that an elk shot on the Buffalo River in October has tested positive for chronic wasting disease.

Chronic wasting disease is caused by a pathological agent called a prion, much like mad cow disease or Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans. It causes fatal neurological degeneration in deer, elk and moose.


The Center for Disease Control’s website says “no strong evidence of CWD transmission to humans has been reported” to date, nor to livestock. Still, it’s recommended that people don’t consume meat from animals suffering from chronic wasting disease.

The disease has been present in Western states for decades and has been detected in a number of other states in the years since, but this is the first time CWD has been found in an animal in the state of Arkansas.


To determine how widespread the disease may be, the Game and Fish Commission will be taking samples from as many as 300 deer and elk in a five mile radius from where the first case was detected. (In this case, “samples” means killing the animals, since “there is no reliable U.S. Department of Agriculture-approved test for CWD while the animals are alive,” according to the press release.)

Here’s the Game and Fish Commission’s release:

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