The Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota has released a detailed report on preparedness and response gaps and needs should chronic wasting disease jump from cervids such as deer to farm animals or people.

While no human CWD cases have been identified, rising disease prevalence in cervids increases the likelihood of human exposures, and prion strain evolution could lead to changes that alter the species barrier, enabling cross-species transmission. Current CWD response efforts are constrained by inconsistent disease surveillance among states and limited resources that would be grossly insufficient if a spillover event were to occur.

The report, "Chronic Wasting Disease Spillover Preparedness and Response: Charting an Uncertain Future," identifies gaps in spillover preparedness and offers recommendations to improve disease research, surveillance, and public and animal health agencies' ability to recognize and respond to potential CWD spillover. 

To produce the report, CIDRAP convened five working groups of 67 distinguished U.S. and international experts in human health, cervid and production animal health, prion biology and disease diagnostics, carcass and contaminated item disposal, and wildlife health and management. The work was supported by a contract from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.

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"Since we began working on this report in 2023, concerns about a CWD prion spillover from cervids to other animal species and humans have only continued to grow in importance, and we're simply not prepared should a species jump occur," said Michael T. Osterholm, CIDRAP director, University of Minnesota Regents Professor and McKnight Presidential Endowed Chair in Public Health.

This effort is the first of its kind and expands on consensus reports, such as one recently posted by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, by exploring the potential for spillover and mitigation of the related health and economic consequences. 

"This is the first time in my experience that a multidisciplinary and truly One Health approach has been taken towards this disease, and the first time we’ve begun to consider 'the day after'—what wildlife managers, agricultural experts and human health professionals would be up against if spillover occurred," said Russ Mason, Ph.D., a nationally recognized expert in wildlife conservation who retired from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and who co-chairs the CIDRAP CWD Contingency Project's wildlife working group.

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Brian Appleby, MD, director of the National Prion Disease Pathology Surveillance Center and co-chair of the CIDRAP CWD human medicine and public health working group, said, "Although basic science research suggests that there is a low likelihood of the disease transmitting to humans, this may change over time due to variations in chronic wasting disease strains as it continues to spread, as well as the possibility of it infecting other animals in which transmission to humans may be more likely."

The report's nine recommendations call for actions based on vulnerabilities identified by the working groups. Examples include cultivating dedicated multiyear CWD funding for research and management; strengthening working partnerships among wildlife managers, agricultural experts, neurologists, the basic research community and human health providers; more robust outreach to improve surveillance and prion-disease reporting by primary care physicians; estimating carcass-disposal capacity needs; and expanding and standardizing CWD disease surveillance through prion strain typing in wild cervids, other potentially affected wildlife, and production animals.

Jason Bartz, Ph.D., professor at Creighton University and co-chair of the animal surveillance and response working group, said, "Thankfully, to date, chronic wasting disease has not transmitted to other species, including humans. As it is well documented that prions can evolve, this current state is not guaranteed."

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"Our next step is to take this report to agencies tasked with CWD surveillance and response to enhance preparations for a possible spillover," said Osterholm. "We are incredibly grateful to the network of CWD experts who contributed their expertise to this effort."

Report creation was led by Osterholm and CWD Project Co-Directors Jamie Umber and Cory Anderson.