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Yeah, because scrapie doesn't resemble a virus, so it doesn't have the same survival concerns. A protein in an exceptionally low-energy conformation is more robust than a ring of RNA, film at 11.

Anyway, fun fact, the prion that causes scrapie is extremely similar to the ones that cause mad cow disease (transmissible to humans) and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (human disease). So yes, we're very, very lucky, so far. Sleep tight.




Actually, the worst cases were from Kuru.

It has a ghastly origin.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuru_(disease)

(I will upvote you now.)


Sure, but Kuru doesn't transmit anywhere near as easily as scrapie does in sheep, which seemed to be the relevant comparison.




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