Animal Health and Veterinary Laboratories Agency, Weybridge, Surrey, UK.
Emerg Infect Dis. 2011 Dec;17(12):2253-61. doi: 10.3201/eid1712.110333.
Transmissible spongiform encephalopathies are fatal neurodegenerative diseases that include variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans, scrapie in small ruminants, and bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in cattle. Scrapie is not considered a public health risk, but BSE has been linked to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. Small ruminants are susceptible to BSE, and in 2005 BSE was identified in a farmed goat in France. We confirm another BSE case in a goat in which scrapie was originally diagnosed and retrospectively identified as suspected BSE. The prion strain in this case was further characterized by mouse bioassay after extraction from formaldehyde-fixed brain tissue embedded in paraffin blocks. Our data show that BSE can infect small ruminants under natural conditions and could be misdiagnosed as scrapie. Surveillance should continue so that another outbreak of this zoonotic transmissible spongiform encephalopathy can be prevented and public health safeguarded.
传染性海绵状脑病是致命的神经退行性疾病，包括人类中的变异型克雅氏病、绵羊中的瘙痒病和牛中的牛海绵状脑病（BSE）。瘙痒病不被认为是公共卫生风险，但 BSE 与变异型克雅氏病有关。小反刍动物易患 BSE，2005 年在法国的一只农场饲养的山羊中发现了 BSE。我们确认了另一个在最初诊断为瘙痒病并追溯为疑似 BSE 的山羊中的 BSE 病例。从福尔马林固定石蜡包埋脑组织中提取后，通过小鼠生物测定进一步对该病例中的朊病毒株进行了特征描述。我们的数据表明，BSE 可以在自然条件下感染小反刍动物，并且可能被误诊为瘙痒病。应继续进行监测，以防止这种人畜共患的传染性海绵状脑病再次爆发，并保护公众健康。
