Kinda a morbid question but could you just sever the finger moments after the prick? Or would the blood pump so fast that the prion(s) is already in your body.
France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
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Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#52Hm: "long period of uncertainty began on 31 May 2010, when she stabbed her left thumb with a curved forceps while cleaning a cryostat—a machine that can cut tissues at very low temperatures—that she used to slice brain sections from transgenic mice infected with a sheep-adapted form of BSE . She pierced two layers of latex gloves and drew blood" Later in the article: ""We conduct research only on mouse-adapted sheep…
"infect" is not the right word. Prions are not viruses, they do not replicate, they ravage other proteins in their surroundings by misfolding them over and over again until it becomes a fatal pathology.
Infect is exactly the right word.
Infectious disease is also called transmissible diseases. Infectious microorganism or agent can be a virus, bacterium, protozoan, prion, viroid, or fungus.
Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#53My heart breaks for these families. I can't help but wonder if the labs are taking the necessary precautions in terms of prion disposal.
I can't imagine the prions are allowed down the drain....
Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#54Scary. I think and airborne human transmissible prion disease that kill in a few years is the kind of event that can bring our society back to prehistoric living in just a few decades. Hope it never happens.
Is this even possible? By what mechanism could a prion disease become airborne?
Viruses have evolved to more easily infect cells in the respiratory tract for this specific purpose, but prions are much less sophisticated.
It seems there may be some evidence they can evolve, but enough to hijack cellular machinery in such a way that they could increase the concentration in the respiratory tract enough to transmit?
Seems a bit far fetched but I’m no prion expert.
Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#55Has there been any research on Prions as a bio-terrorism weapon? It sounds like you could infect thousands/millions and have a close to 100% death-rate without anyone noticing until many years after the contamination started. Imaging contaminating food/drinking water with the Prion which causes Kuru [1] for example. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuru_(disease)
I've always thought a _very_ effective strategy would be to get a crop-duster and spray a prion-contaminated mist over a major city, basically contaminating every public surface in a large area I'm also not sure how you would begin to clean up afterwards - do you remove the surface of everything in your city? To those saying bio-terrorism is ineffective or would not kill a lot of people in any appreciable time-scale,…
It's not really effective because it takes years to manifest symptoms of prion disease. Terrorism usually has a message attached to it, and "you're gonna start dying in 10 years" is not conducive to messaging.
Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#56Prions are weird. I was at UCSF during the time they went from a fringe theory to an established fact and a nobel prize. The professor who studied them (Prusiner) had to overcome tons of resistance and the experiments were heroic (often waiting months for mice to die). It's really funny that everybody resisted it until somebody mentioned that there was a plausible physical mechanism of refolding catalysis.
Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#57Kinda a morbid question but could you just sever the finger moments after the prick? Or would the blood pump so fast that the prion(s) is already in your body.
They mention in the article that normal protocol is to immediately soak the thumb in bleach. Not sure if that’s actually effective though, or just hopeful.
Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#58Hm: "long period of uncertainty began on 31 May 2010, when she stabbed her left thumb with a curved forceps while cleaning a cryostat—a machine that can cut tissues at very low temperatures—that she used to slice brain sections from transgenic mice infected with a sheep-adapted form of BSE . She pierced two layers of latex gloves and drew blood" Later in the article: ""We conduct research only on mouse-adapted sheep…
“Never been shown to” is the kind of false speak I keep hearing from the government and media.
Just because you’ve never tried it doesn’t mean you have shown something.
Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#59Hm: "long period of uncertainty began on 31 May 2010, when she stabbed her left thumb with a curved forceps while cleaning a cryostat—a machine that can cut tissues at very low temperatures—that she used to slice brain sections from transgenic mice infected with a sheep-adapted form of BSE . She pierced two layers of latex gloves and drew blood" Later in the article: ""We conduct research only on mouse-adapted sheep…
"infect" is not the right word. Prions are not viruses, they do not replicate, they ravage other proteins in their surroundings by misfolding them over and over again until it becomes a fatal pathology.
Techynically you are incorrect. Infect is the right word. Worked at the institution that established this. (I do not believe that koch's postulates cover all cases of 'infection').
Re: France issues moratorium on prion research after fatal brain disease strikes
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
They are going to stop studying so they can start studying the issue? Ah well, this is the level of ‘science’ we’ve come to expect in the pandemic.
No, they're gonna stop studying until they have reviewed all the security protocols regarding the handling of prions, and this, nationwide.
There are reviews and then there are reviews: Rubber stamp security reviews happen.
I don't know much about this particular case, but I think, in general, a trustworthy review needs to be conducted by an independent body with genuine power (edit. and desire) to order things to halt permanently if they can not be made safe enough (and then there is a separate question of who makes the call "what is safe enough").