Prion Diseases

Prion diseases, or transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs), are a family of rare disorders that affect the brains of both humans and animals. The most common prion disease in humans is Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), which affects approximately 1 in a million people worldwide each year. Prion diseases usually progress rapidly and are always fatal. For information on the number of CJD cases in Wyoming, please visit our Reports and Statistics page.

In Wyoming, chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a type of prion disease that affects cervids (a group of animals that includes deer, elk, and moose).  There is no direct proof that humans can get CWD.  However, animal studies suggest CWD poses a risk to some types of non-human primates, like monkeys, that eat meat from CWD-infected animals. These experimental studies raise the concern that CWD may pose a risk to humans and suggest that it is important to prevent exposures to CWD.  Therefore, the Centers for Disease Control and the World Health Organization recommend that CWD positive animals not be consumed. Do not eat meat from animals that appear sick. However, animals can be sick with CWD and still not show symptoms, so hunters can have their game meat tested for CWD. For more information on CWD testing visit the Wyoming Game and Fish Department website.

Suspected CJD and other human prion diseases are reportable to public health in Wyoming. If you would like to report a case of human prion disease please visit our Disease Reporting page or call the Infectious Disease Epidemiology unit at 877-996-9000.

If you have any questions about prion diseases, please call the Infectious Disease Epidemiology unit at 877-996-9000 and ask to speak to someone about prion diseases.