Alzheimer’s disease transmission may be similar to infectious prion diseases

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.uthouston.edu/media/story.htm?id=3541058

Alzheimer’s disease transmission may be similar to infectious prion diseases

Soto leads UTHealth research

HOUSTON – (Oct. 4, 2011) – The brain damage that characterizes Alzheimer’s disease may originate in a form similar to that of infectious prion diseases such as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (mad cow) and Creutzfeldt-Jakob, according to newly published research by http://www.uthouston.edu/">The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth).

“Our findings open the possibility that some of the sporadic Alzheimer’s cases may arise from an infectious process, which occurs with other neurological diseases such as mad cow and its human form, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease,” said http://neurology.uth.tmc.edu/faculty/bio-Claudio-Soto.htm">Claudio Soto, Ph.D., professor of neurology at The University of Texas Medical School at Houston, part of UTHealth. “The underlying mechanism of Alzheimer’s disease is very similar to the prion diseases. It involves a normal protein that becomes misshapen and is able to spread by transforming good proteins to bad ones. The bad proteins accumulate in the brain, forming plaque deposits that are believed to kill neuron cells in Alzheimer’s.”

The results showing a potentially infectious spreading of Alzheimer’s disease in animal models were published in the Oct. 4, 2011 online issue of Molecular Psychiatry, part of the Nature Publishing Group. The research was funded by http://www.uthouston.edu/media/story.htm?id=1285646">The George P. and Cynthia W. Mitchell Center for Research in Alzheimer's Disease and Related Brain Disorders at UTHealth.

…

Researchers injected the brain tissue of a confirmed Alzheimer’s patient into mice and compared the results to those from injected tissue of a control without the disease. None of the mice injected with the control showed signs of Alzheimer’s, whereas all of those injected with Alzheimer's brain extracts developed plaques and other brain alterations typical of the disease.

…

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/mp.2011.120

[defendandprotect]

1. True -- Alzheimer's = MAD COW --

And it takes 20 years or more to show up --

[kestrel91316]

2. I have been saying this FOR YEARS, ever since they discovered

that other variant of BSE called BASE, with the amyloidotic plaques instead of spongiform changes.

Wake up and smell the coffee, people. We DO know what causes Alzheimer's - we are just in denial about it, and Big Ag won't let the conversation get onto the table.

[Auntie Bush]

4. I guess I need Alzheimers for dummies.

Now what causes Alzheimer's...with laymen's easy terminology? Please splain again,

[kestrel91316]

7. IMHO Alzheimer's is caused by BASE, a prion disease closely akin to

but not identical to BSE.

BSE = bovine spongiform encephalopathy aka "mad cow disease" http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/bse/index.htm

BASE = bovine amyloidotic spongiform encephalopathy, which is another type of "mad cow" http://www.pnas.org/content/101/9/3065.full

IMHO both traditional "Mad Cow" disease in humans and Alzheimer's are prion diseases, zoonotic in nature, and directly attributable to consumption of infected beef. The medical community acknowledges the one but not the other because, well..........just imagine the political economic, and cultural implications.......

The characteristic amyloid plaques are the important clue here.

[Auntie Bush]

12. Thanks Kestrel!

Now I get it. You may get it from eating infected beef...makes sense.

[Bosonic]

16. This article mention vegetarians

and also lots of Indians have contracted Alzheimer's.

http://www.themedguru.com/20101029/newsfeature/vegetarians-likely-suffer-dementia-alzheimers-researchers-86141281.html

Neither demographic are avid Beef eaters, so if it is a vector it's certainly not the main one...

[truedelphi]

23. Scientifically speaking, dementia that results from Vitamin B 12

levels not being properly absorbed by a person, or not being anywhere in their diet to begin with, that dementia is not Alzheimer's.

For one thing, if the person who has the dementia has a doctor who is trained in dealing with Vitamin B 12 - how to test for it, and how to see if it is absorbed and available to the person, and then should it be discovered that the levels are low, the doctor can start the person on Vitamin B 12 shots, which will reverse the dementia.

[Name removed]

20. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[william12]

21. causes

Sometimes family history plays a major role in Alzheimer. except this external environment, internal environment of body are also causes of this.

[Festivito]

3. "whereas all of those injected with Alzheimer's brain extracts developed plaques "

All! Could not verify that use of the word all. But, ... all. Wow.

[DirkGently]

5. That's fairly gigantic. No hereditary / genetic component? You "catch" Alzhiemer's?

[TwilightGardener]

6. Maybe it only looks genetic because families tend to eat the same things

or do the same activities, live together, etc. Plus it seems to take a long time to manifest itself, so no one would expect that both younger and older generations are "catching" it from the same source many years before it shows up.

[kestrel91316]

8. Excellent outside-the-box thinking.

[DirkGently]

9. If it's really foodborne, someone needs to figure out the source pretty fast.

[kestrel91316]

11. We already know the source - it's the same as BSE/Mad Cow: beef.

BASE brain lesions in cattle (or the rats they studied, I forget which?) are virtually identical to those in humans with Alzheimer's.

Here's something people should start doing, but the pathologists are probably all secretly terrified to handle the tissue: demand brain pathological studies on ALL Alzheimer's patients. The truth will out.

[TwilightGardener]

10. Thanks!

I have a particular interest in whether or not it's genetic, because it's on both sides of my family.

[defendandprotect]

13. 20 year incubation period .... It's MAD COW cause they live long enough to show the

effects of having been fed "other animals" -- and even road kill!!

However, Chickens and other animals who may also be suffering what is

ultimately a disase caused by cannibalism which we've known about for

100's of years -- may be slaughtered before the disease start to have

obvious effects on their bodies.

[JoeyT]

17. Susceptibility to some prionic diseases is genetic.

Fatal Familial Insomnia being the most well known (and absolutely godawful) one.

[OKIsItJustMe]

18. That’s not what they’re saying…

…

“Our findings open the possibility that some of the sporadic Alzheimer’s cases may arise from an infectious process, which occurs with other neurological diseases such as mad cow and its human form, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease,” …

i.e. not that there is no hereditary/genetic component, only that in some cases where there is no identified hereditary/genetic component (i.e. “sporadic Alzheimer’s cases”) that it may be caused from an infectious process.

[applegrove]

14. That is what Deny Crane called his alzheimers on Boston Legal.

[william12]

15. what it is really

Mad cow is also known as BSE. It is called Mad Cow because it affects cow’s nervous system. Due to that cow acts strangely.

[leftyladyfrommo]

19. Does this mean everyone on the Adkins Diet is a goner?

Those people eat tons of meat.

[hshields]

22. Alzheimer's is prion disease caused by tainted beef

 

	

	

	

	



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Nobel Laureate Stanley Prusiner (UCSF) and other scientists
say Alzheimer's Disease (AD)  and Parkinson Disease (PD) in
humans are  transmissible prion/protein misfolding diseases:  
    
http://sludgevictims.com/pathogens/ALZHEIMERS-CJD-samepriondisease.doc

Recent research by Dr. Claudio Soto, et al, University of
Texas Medical School, has confirmed earlier research which
found injecting Alzheimer's brain material into mice brains
caused infectious prion disease.   (see other research
confirming AD is a prion disease  -
http://www.alzheimers-prions.com/    )
 
Human prion diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, may
be due to  lack of USDA testing for mad cow disease (in 2010
only 34,386  cows were tested out of 37 million slaughtered in
the US)
http://www.aphis.usda.gov/newsroom/hot_issues/bse/surveillance/ongoing_surv_results.shtml
 
Prions in animal feeds are also a serious risk:

   The US Dept. of Agriculture has been covering up for years
the fact that 1.9 million "downer cows" - the
animals most likely to have Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy
(BSE) - (Mad Cow Disease) - are rendered into animal feeds and
pet food every year.  Only about 5000 downers in the whole
United States are tested for BSE each year.  Rendering does
not inactivate prions.
 
Livestock, sheep, goats, pigs, poultry, dogs, cats, etc. are
being fed the MBM (meat and bone meal) rendered remains of
potentially prion infected animals.   
 
http://www.sludgevictims.com/prions/downers.html
 
 
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) (mad cow) has been
circulating and amplifying in the US food chain since the mid
1980s when Dr. Richard Marsh proved that farmed mink were
dying from Transmissible Mink Encephalopathy (TME) after 
being fed downer cattle.  
http://www.organicconsumers.org/madcow/andrew1804.cfm



Prions in blood and tissues of an AD victim  are  a pathway of
iatrogenic transmission risk, particularly on medical, dental
and eye equipment which is not completely sterilized - a very
difficult task .
 
 "Could Alzheimer's be infectious? "  
http://neurophilosophy.wordpress.com/2006/11/24/could-alzheimers-be-infectious/
 
SEE reply posted by:
Dr. Murray Waldman, coroner for the city of Toronto, Canada:
"In answer to the question how would Alzheimer’s (AD) be
transmitted, I have written a book “Dying For A Hamburger”
that hypothesizes that AD is spread by how we in North America
and Europe feed and process meat, mainly beef.
If you study the rates of AD and its geographical
distribution, you will find that rates start to soar when a
country becomes meat eating (i.e. Japan and Korea in the
1960s) and rises even faster when it adopts a fast food
culture (the US and Western Europe in the 50s and 60s) and
remains low in vegetarian countries (India) and those without
a processed meat industry or fast foods (equatorial
Africa)…Murray "

 See VIDEO Interview –Mad Cow and Misdiagnosed Alzheimer’s
Disease:

 http://www.healthydepartment.com/alzheimers-disease/interview-mad-cow-and-misdiagnosed-alzheimers-disease-4541.html

 Interview with Dr. Colm Kelleher author of “Brain Trust:The
Hidden Connection Between Mad Cow and Misdiagnosed Alzheimer’s
Disease” recorded November 16, 2004. video about 1 hour long –
well worth the time 
***************************************************************

 Prion diseases (including Alzheimer's) may also be caused by
modern meat packing practices whereby " a typical burger
patty is packed with the meat and fat of 50 to 100 cattle from
multiple states and two to four countries.

 Eat two hamburgers  a week — as the average American does —
and in a year's time the consumer samples a stampede: 5,200 to
10,400 cattle."    
 http://www.think-aboutit.com/health/CattleDrive.htm

********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

Alzheimer's victims are excreting infectious prions in their
urine, feces, saliva, and mucus.
Prion expert Dr. Adriano Aguzzi stated:    "Further
research by the team showed that, if inflammation is induced
in any excretory organ of the body, prions are excreted in
whatever substance the organ excretes. "

Sewage treatment does not inactivate the prions - it
concentrates them in the sewage sludge biosolids being spread
on America's crop lands.

Human and animal prions in sewage sludge "biosolids"
being being spread on home vegetable gardens and topdressed as
"fertilizer" on America's cropland, including
grazing land, hay fields and dairy pastures, are putting
people,  livestock and wildlife at risk:    
http://www.sludgevictims.com/pathogens/prion.html

Dr. Joel Pedersen, et als, Prion researchers funded by US EPA
and DOE,   found that sewage treatment does NOT  inactivate
prions.    Dr. Pedersen stated:
  
." Finally, the disposal of sludge was considered to
represent the greatest risk of spreading (prion) infectivity
to other premises."

Helane Shields, Alton,NH   [e-mail]