Link to Disease in Cattle and Humans
I'm Bob Larson. A professor at Washington State University is part of a research group that's published a case further linking two gastrointestinal diseases ... one in cattle and one in humans.
Dr. William Davis says Johne's disease is a major disease in cattle worldwide, caused by a microorganism linked to a suspiciously similar Crohn's disease in humans.
Dr. Davis says it's hard to trace because most humans are just carriers who never come down with the disease ...
DR WILLIAM DAVIS ... "It means in dairy herds it's very difficult to diagnose because they don't develop any obvious antibody response until they're advanced in the disease. So that they're shedding the bacteria in the dairy herds so that all animals are constantly exposed to it. A larger number, I think the latest I've read is that about 67 percent of the dairy herds in the U.S. are infected with Mycrobacterium Paratuberculosis to some extent."
Dr. Davis says slaughtering valuable cattle is not as practical as developing a vaccine ...
DR WILLIAM DAVIS ... "Looking at first understanding the immune system of cattle and then getting to a point where technology's at an advanced stage where we can actually make a vaccine for microbaterial pathogens, but a lot more work needs to be done to achieve that goal, but that's what we're after."
In recent report by Dr. Davis and his colleagues in India, it described a patient who illness more closely linked the Johne's and Crohn's. He was treated successfully with antibiotics known to be effective for tuberculosis.
