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Brain Eater, The
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Program Overview
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In 1986, a small number of British cattle came down with a new illness called
Mad Cow Disease. Only a few years later, the name would be a household word and
the disease an epidemic among British herds. A form of a brain disease known as
spongiform encephalopathy, the fatal disease probably infected cows who ate a
food supplement containing remains of sheep infected with a similar form of the
illness.
More recently, people who ate infected beef have been found with a new variant
of the disease. Is a large human epidemic brewing or will the infection end
with the handful of people who have already been diagnosed? How does the
disease infect? Is it through a rogue protein—as some researchers
believe—rather than a virus or bacteria? NOVA tracks the work of scientists,
epidemiologists, and policy-makers as they seek to understand the puzzling
nature of the disease and its possible transmission to humans.
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