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GNWT monitoring deer disease

A fatal, infectious disease to which there is no cure is slowly spreading among deer populations in Saskatchewan and Alberta, and one infected herd has been spotted close to 100 km from territory through which NWT caribou roam, according to an Alberta researcher.

Some symptoms of CWD animals may express before dying are difficulty swallowing, excess salivation, excessive thirst, lack of coordination, paralysis, pneumonia, general unusual behavior, excessive urination and weight loss.

The sickness, chronic wasting disease (CWD), has also been found among reindeer in Norway, says University of Alberta biologist Debbie McKenzie, which suggests caribou could be susceptible to it.

"There's no treatment. It's always fatal. There's no vaccine for it. There's a number of groups that have been trying for decades to make a vaccine. So once it's in the deer, there's nothing we can do," says McKenzie.

No cases of CWD have yet been found in the NWT, stated Department of Environment and Natural Resources spokesperson Joslyn Oosenbrug in an email.

Cases of CWD are mostly clustered around the southern thirds of Alberta and Saskatchewan, near the provincial border between them. The disease has not been seen in big numbers in the northern regions of the provinces.

"While the likelihood of CWD being introduced into northern caribou populations may be low, if it were to be introduced to a barren-ground caribou population it is likely it would become established and spread among caribou within northern herds," wrote Oosenbrug, noting the disease develops and spreads slowly, and is also slow in making the jump to a new species.

"For this reason, preventing the introduction of the disease into caribou is the primary focus of our CWD management efforts."

The GNWT has been actively communicating with their southern peers on the issue of CWD, according to Oosenbrug, and has conducted targeted testing on caribou and moose in the southern regions of the NWT.

In addition, the GNWT is currently developing a management plan that could be put into effect in case the disease does enter northern populations. This will be developed in cooperation with the NWT's regional and Indigenous partners.

"To prevent transmission from infected meat of animal products, the GNWT may consider regulations to prevent animals from infected areas from being transported into the NWT," wrote Oosenbrug. "Hunters are also encouraged to have their animals tested through the existing surveillance programs in (Alberta) and (Saskatchewan) if they are hunting in those areas prior to bringing this material into the NWT."

The disease is also part of the Wildlife Health Strategy, currently in development at the GNWT, she wrote.

McKenzie says the Alberta and Saskatchewan governments are both working on the problem, and the best solution, unfortunately, at this point is to eliminate the infected animals.

Chronic wasting disease is what's known as a prion disease. A misfolded protein induces other proteins to misfold, spreading throughout the body and brain of an animal causing it to degenerate.

According to the Government of Canada, some symptoms animals may express before dying are difficulty swallowing, excess salivation, excessive thirst, lack of coordination, paralysis, pneumonia, general unusual behavior, excessive urination and weight loss.

No cases have ever been reported in humans, but humans should not risk consuming the meat of an infected animal.

Part of what makes monitoring and reaction to the disease so urgent is how easy it is to spread.

"We're not sure (exactly) how it moves from deer to deer but we know that saliva, fecal material, urine all contain infectious CWD agent," says McKenzie. "...We also know that the prions that get shed in saliva and feces end up in soil and it binds to the soil and it stays there for a long time."

McKenzie says the main effort right now is to reduce the infected deer population.

"If we can reduce the (infected) deer population to as close to zero as possible, then there's not going to be any transmission of CWD, and as long as the number of animals infected is really low then the environmental contamination should be low."