Kourou disease

Kuru disease is the earliest researched human prion disease. Prion is different from any pathogenic microorganism based on nucleic acid replication that humans have discovered so far. It is a nucleic acid that lacks nucleic acid and does not require nucleic acid replication. Proliferating protein infectious particles. Kuru disease is only seen in the Fore ethnic group on the eastern plateau of New Guinea, with a population of only 30,000 to 40,000, due to the participation in the religious ritual of cannibalism. More than 200 people died of tremor and dysfunctional walking in one year. Called Kuru locally. Kuru disease has a long incubation period, ranging from 4 to 30 years. The onset is hidden. Patients in the prodromal period only experience headaches and joint pain, followed by ataxia, tremor, and involuntary movements. The latter include chorea, myoclonus Etc. In the later stages of the disease, progressively worsening dementia and neurological abnormalities appear. In the United States, NIH Gajdusek, in view of the similarities between Kuru brain changes and scrapie of sheep, Kuru brains were ground and inoculated into orangutan brains, and animals became ill 13 months later. He believes that the pathogen is a special lentivirus called an unusual lentivirus. At present, the disease is favored as a transmissible neurological degenerative disease caused by mutant prion protein, also known as prion disease or protein particle disease. As a result, the unusual lentiviral infection theory advocated by Gajdusek many years ago was rejected.