HEALTHY animals can carry an infectious form of the prion disease scrapie
without ever developing symptoms, say researchers in London. They have found
that symptom-free mice can harbour hamster scrapie for years, with enough of the
agent in their brains to infect other animals.
The results raise the possibility that many seemingly healthy cattle in
Britain鈥攁nd across Europe鈥攃ould harbour BSE, the prion disease that
can cause the deadly variant CJD in people. They also provide an unexpected
insight into the nature of prion disease.
Scientists had assumed that animals inoculated with prions either succumbed
to the disease鈥攕ometimes after…
