The First American Victims of Zombie Deer Disease

Two Wyoming hunters have become the first Americans to die from "zombie deer disease" after eating infected venison.  

Experts have been warning for years that the nearly 100 percent fatal chronic wasting disease (CWD) - which leaves deer confused, drooling, and unafraid of humans - could jump from animals to people.  But a new study says that it has already happened - in two hunters who died in 2022 after eating contaminated venison.  One of the victims, a 72-year-old man, suffered 'rapid-onset confusion and aggression,' as well as seizures. He died within a month.

He was diagnosed after his death with Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), a brain-wasting condition similar to chronic wasting disease (CWD).  The hunter's friend also died from the disease but there were limited details about his condition in the research published last week in the journal Neurology.

 CWD is nicknamed "zombie deer disease'"because it causes parts of the brain to slowly degenerate to a spongy consistency and animals will drool and stare blankly before they die.  There are no treatments or vaccines, and the disease is 100 percent fatal.

The exact route of transmission is not fully understood, but it is thought that it is spread animal to animal by eating forage or water contaminated by infected feces or exposure to carcasses.  Direct contact, including saliva, blood, urine and even antler velvet during annual shedding may also contribute to the transmission of the pathogen. Any deer that dies on a farm must be tested for chronic wasting disease.  Because the disease is so contagious, if one animal test positive, the entire herd is considered infected.

Map of CWD-infected wild herds, based on March 2024 data from state wildlife agencies & the USGS

 The condition is thought to only infect animals like deer, elk, reindeer, caribou and moose.  Chronic wasting disease was initially discovered in 1967 in captive deer in Colorado.  It has now been found in animals in at least 32 states, four Canadian provinces and four other foreign countries, according to the CDC.   The three states with the largest distribution of CWD-infected deer are Kansas (49 counties), Nebraska (43 counties), and Wisconsin (43 counties).   The most recent case in deer was in Kentucky last fall, according to the Kentucky Department of Fish & Wildlife.