I have seen a report of a guy in either CO or MT who died from eating infected elk. Will I risk my 5 1/2 yr old daughter? I think not!
I'll go for other game, or go to "safe" areas.
All I am asking for is the right to pay to have critters tested; without the USDA stopping me from doing so!
MARK A SITY
The problem is that since ALL mammals appear to harbor some variant of this prion disease (thought to be due to mis-folding of a brain protein, which then cannot be eliminated by the normal "clean-up" processes in the brain), you would theoretically be unsafe eating ANY meat at all. After all, prion disease is well-documented in squirrels, mink, and sheep in the U.S. (look up "scrapie"), yet we are not all dead.
Also, since something like 100 cases of HUMAN CJD occur each year in the U.S., it is likely that a single case in someone who ate elk (or squirrel, or Jello) is coincidental. The proteins can be differentiated, though, and I am sure that if ANY human case of "Chronic Wasting Disease" had been found, I would have seen it.