Friday, December 1, 2017

“Ye Shall Know the Truth”… Eventually!



 
Where CWD originated in northern Missouri... in deer pens where does were purchased from various states

         Many of the newspapers that use my column receive and use letters from the Missouri Department of Conservation concerning what I write. That is good, we should hear both sides. But before you read this column, you should know that many newspapers, the big ones in large cities, would never print this column, even as a letter to the editor. Recently many newspapers printed a letter from someone calling himself the ‘executive’ director of the Conservation Federation of Missouri, defending their ‘Share Your Harvest’ program which distributes deer meat to the poor.

         Such venison comes, as a rule, from those trophy hunters who just want to shoot a buck with a nice set of antlers and not have to mess with the meat.  While I do not approve of such ‘hunting’, I have always been supportive of that program, providing venison to those who need it. That is UNTIL the Chronic Wasting Disease came along.  Let me tell you for the last time why I think it should come to a screeching halt. Then you can decide if you wish to eat donated deer meat. There IS another side to hear.

         Recently at the Wal-Mart sporting goods counter, a lady selling deer tags was telling folks that the MDC has determined that Chronic Wasting Disease will not affect humans. That is pure nonsense! The MDC has propagated that kind of thinking not by lying about it so much as just neglecting to tell the whole truth.  Almost no one knows much about the deer disease… even doctors. It is caused by rogue proteins known as ‘prions’ which is also the exact thing that causes a disease in humans known as Jakob-Kruetzfeldt.  In England when that disease began to show up in cattle, hundreds and perhaps thousands died from it. They got it from eating that diseased beef and getting those prions inside their body.

          A good number of deer hunters in Missouri have also died from prions in their system, and it has been hidden. Those prions attack and destroy the brain.  Death can take several weeks or months, but believe me, no media, nor the MDC has ever talked with relatives of those who died from the disease. I have!!  My daughter, who is a doctor, told me she saw a man who died from Jakob-Kruetzfeld disease in medical school in Columbia, Missouri.
  
         Those who are sure their loved ones died from eating prion-affected venison deserve to be heard and in my next issue of the Lightnin’ Ridge Outdoor magazine I will see to it many of them tell their story. One lady telling me that her husband died from the disease attracted immediate attention from the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta. They had his body escorted from a St. Louis hospital by the highway patrol to the crematory because they feared someone might handle it if the ambulance was involved in an accident. The body of anyone known to have died from the ingestion of prions is not sent to a funeral home, but cremated as soon as possible.

         Folks like the ‘executive’ director of the Conservation Federation will tell you that since this awful disease in humans can be derived by eating elk, beef, goat or sheep, no one can be sure that the disease which has killed many humans in Missouri, was caused by eating deer meat. And so they allow untested venison handed over to various meat processors to be given to the poor, with no warning whatsoever. What if the deer was shot in the brain, the spleen, the spinal column, the bladder?  What if a processing company grinds up meat for hamburger, including the lymph nodes, which are never removed? Does that puzzle you?  Read this paragraph sent out this year by the Center For Disease Control in Atlanta Georgia on November 3, 2017…

“Hunters should avoid eating meat from deer and elk that look sick or test positive for CWD. They should wear gloves when field-dressing carcasses, bone-out the meat from the animal, and minimize handling of brain and spinal cord tissues. As a precaution, hunters should avoid eating deer and elk tissues known to harbor the CWD agent (e.g., brain, spinal cord, eyes, spleen, tonsils, lymph nodes) from areas where CWD has been identified.”

        The MDC and the Conservation Federation will not tell you this, and the deer meat they send you from various meat processors as part of the ‘share your harvest’ program has NOT BEEN TESTED!

          I don’t want to tell readers what to do. You come up with your own conclusions.  The chances may be that 100,000 people could eat that venison and no more than one or two or three will ingest those horrible prions. The risk may be more minimal than the chance of being struck by lightning.  But no one knows. I just want to see everyone know that the risk is there, and it is important to know why the Conservation Federation and the MDC want to keep hunters uninformed.  Both could lose millions of dollars if there were huge numbers of deer tags sold. Trophy hunters from out of state pay a tremendous amount to shoot a deer in Missouri with big antlers, and turn the meat over to be eaten by the poor.  But is there anyone in the state so poor they ought to be handed a risk they have no knowledge of whatsoever?

         And for that, the powers that be who decide that untested, possibly diseased deer should be given away, enable trophy hunters to be legal, as ‘wanton waste’ of wildlife is a criminal offense. Anyone receiving donated venison should also know that in deer pen operations where domestically raised buck deer are killed by trophy hunters, the deer is injected a day before he is killed with chemicals which have warnings on the box that the chemical should not be given to animals which are to be eaten. That meat is indeed given away, because of that ‘share your harvest’ program. Maybe the warning on the box of that chemical is just so much baloney. But the people of the state who receive it, need to know what they are eating.

         So now you have information that you will not hear anywhere else… the news media? Not on your life. Remember that I wrote for the Springfield News Leader when the MDC ‘made a deal’ with the company to provide free information in return for not using any of my columns that criticized them, or any other news about them in the paper that they did not approve of. Have you ever seen any effort by the news media, including T.V. stations in your area, that criticized the MDC or the Conservation Federation in any way?

         Everything you have read here is the truth, and I will go anywhere, anytime to discuss this. I have challenged the MDC to bring their whole staff to some auditorium or large meeting hall to debate this. I will come alone but for the relatives of those who died from the disease. Many of them have something to say that should be heard.

                  Next column, I have a good mountain lion story for you, and information about a call I received from the State Auditor’s office. 
My new email address is lightninridge47@gmail.com.  You can write to me at Box 22, Bolivar, Mo. 65613.  You may call my office and talk with me at
417-777-5227.



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