Kuru, for one. In general, disease is much more a concern the closer you are to what it is you're eating. Feeding cows to cows hasn't worked out so well for us.
Diseases akin to hoof-in-mouth. The WhaleShark can fill you in on the details.
Wow, I had no idea. I wonder what mechanisms cause said diseases and why they are caused by eating food of similar genetic origins to oneself.
Kuru, for one. In general, disease is much more a concern the closer you are to what it is you're eating. Feeding cows to cows hasn't worked out so well for us.
While I'm not in any way in favor of cannibalism, but isn't kuru only a concern if you eat nerve tissue like brains and spinal cords? I doubt you would get Kuru from eating muscle tissue. There are, however, many non-kuru concerns that would be quite worrisome.
In addition to my previous statements, I would also like to point out that harvesting milk does not KILL a human being. Cannibalism would at the very least maim a human being, if not kill.
Kuru, for one. In general, disease is much more a concern the closer you are to what it is you're eating. Feeding cows to cows hasn't worked out so well for us.
Diseases akin to hoof-in-mouth. The WhaleShark can fill you in on the details.
Wow, I had no idea. I wonder what mechanisms cause said diseases and why they are caused by eating food of similar genetic origins to oneself.
Well, there are some diseases that are more readily communicated within a species than between two different species. Disease-causing organisms adapt themselves to the host they infect, so if a human has a disease, it becomes human-adapted, and that disease is more readily communicated between people. Eating meat from a human carrying that disease would result in a higher rate of transmission of that disease.
Kuru is a prion disease, much like mad cow. Prions are cool; they're misfolded brain proteins that appear to be able to "infect" other nearby brain proteins and cause them to misfold as well. In a cow, the pattern of misfolding causes bovine spongiform encepholopathy (BSE or "mad cow"), which, as you might guess from the name, literally causes the cow's brain to turn into a sponge, introducing little holes all over place, causing erratic behavior and ultimately death.
Humans can contract a disease from cows that suffer from BSE, but the rate of transmission is lower cow-human than it is cow-cow. There is a fairly large homology between the brain proteins of most mammals, but the few differences are typically enough that each organisms recognizes them as being "different," for the most part. Obviously, mutations occur, so there is a small degree of cross-recognition between species. However, the rate of recognition is very low, so overall, the rate of transmission is relatively low because the human brain doesn't typically recognize the cow brain protein, misfolded or not.
With kuru, however, the rate of recognition is stupid high, because human brain proteins are nearly identical between all members of the species. Thus, the rate of transmission is very high.
The host-adapted disease thing is the reason we've had problems like Dutch elm disease; when you have a monoclonal population (members of the population are genetically identical to one another), a single adapted disease will rapidly wipe out the entire population, as no individual member has a defense mechanism that the others lack.
Protein cross-recognition is another interesting facet of biology. Take BGH (bovine growth hormone) for example. Generally, the active site of human growth hormone receptors will not recognize BGH, so humans won't be affected by it. There is often a low level of cross reactivity, but it's not usually enough to matter. However, very rarely, some people have higher rates of similar receptors, so they can actually utilize BGH with higher efficacy, and that creates some interesting problems, like 5 year old kids with facial hair.
Of course, it's incredibly rare. There's a lot of flap about growth hormones in milk and food, particularly concerning the use of rBGH (recombinant bovine growth hormone, which can greatly increase milk production). There's been extensive testing concerning the use of rBGH and the effect of animal hormones on human growth, and by and large, most people don't need to be concerned at all.
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Kuru is a prion disease, much like mad cow. Prions are cool; they're misfolded brain proteins that appear to be able to "infect" other nearby brain proteins and cause them to misfold as well. In a cow, the pattern of misfolding causes bovine spongiform encepholopathy (BSE or "mad cow"), which, as you might guess from the name, literally causes the cow's brain to turn into a sponge, introducing little holes all over place, causing erratic behavior and ultimately death.
Humans can contract a disease from cows that suffer from BSE, but the rate of transmission is lower cow-human than it is cow-cow. There is a fairly large homology between the brain proteins of most mammals, but the few differences are typically enough that each organisms recognizes them as being "different," for the most part. Obviously, mutations occur, so there is a small degree of cross-recognition between species. However, the rate of recognition is very low, so overall, the rate of transmission is relatively low because the human brain doesn't typically recognize the cow brain protein, misfolded or not.
With kuru, however, the rate of recognition is stupid high, because human brain proteins are nearly identical between all members of the species. Thus, the rate of transmission is very high.
The host-adapted disease thing is the reason we've had problems like Dutch elm disease; when you have a monoclonal population (members of the population are genetically identical to one another), a single adapted disease will rapidly wipe out the entire population, as no individual member has a defense mechanism that the others lack.
Protein cross-recognition is another interesting facet of biology. Take BGH (bovine growth hormone) for example. Generally, the active site of human growth hormone receptors will not recognize BGH, so humans won't be affected by it. There is often a low level of cross reactivity, but it's not usually enough to matter. However, very rarely, some people have higher rates of similar receptors, so they can actually utilize BGH with higher efficacy, and that creates some interesting problems, like 5 year old kids with facial hair.
Of course, it's incredibly rare. There's a lot of flap about growth hormones in milk and food, particularly concerning the use of rBGH (recombinant bovine growth hormone, which can greatly increase milk production). There's been extensive testing concerning the use of rBGH and the effect of animal hormones on human growth, and by and large, most people don't need to be concerned at all.