No human health problem with Johne's disease

[Igor_Passau]

Conclusion

With the sheep industry in an internal battle about how to manage ovine Johne's disease and Queensland trying to control the spread of bovine Johne's disease in cattle, it's a controversial time to raise a human health link.

But Professor Warwick Selby is keen to see the debate aired rationally.

"I think it's important to keep it in perspective and when people say Johne's disease and Crohn's are the same and that Crohn's disease is caused by mycobacterium paratuberculosis.

"I think we need to step back from that and say that it's very likely that the organism is there as a commensal in an environment where it can live very easily because these people have abnormal immune systems, and it's not the bacteria itself causing the inflammation."

"The incidence of Crohn's disease is lower in rural communities than in urban communities, so if it was just farm related we would expect to see farmers getting Crohn's more than other people, and that doesn't not occur. "

http://www.abc.net.au/rural/content/2013/s3682553.htm

 

[kiny]

Horrible article. Maybe they should check who they're interviewing first.

Professor Warwick Selby is a member of the advisory boards of Abbot, Ferring Pharmaceuticals and MSD.

Not a single person with crohn's disease is helped by the discussion about money.

GI nor the dairy federation have any business making calls about MAP causality, it should be left over to scientists who can look at this without bias.




"Beside that, it's very difficult to find any evidence of the organism in milk at all."

Not so, it's incredibly easy to find it in milk, MAP is very heat resistant and easily survives pasteurisation and has consistently been found in the food chain without any difficulties.

"Some centres have found that if they look into the tissue of patients with Crohn's disease they can find evidence the organism may be there. Other people have not been able to show that."

How easy is it to find other mycobacteria? Do you have an easy time finding M Leprae or M Bovis? Which evidence do you have that it would be in tissue during a colonoscopy, it might be in the lymphatics, the lymph nodes or endothelia cells. It has been found in the lymphatic system in people with crohn's disease. Recent studies show lymphatic drainage issues and obstruction and the Nature study shows mycobacteria susceptibility. Dispelling mycobacteria because they can't find it on a regular colonoscopy is ignorant. Many inflammatory diseases are not even related to a single bacteria, most PID feature multiple pathogens.

"properly designed studies are not effective"

Properly designed studies should be using antibiotics that are effective against MAP, current therapy is not very effective against MAP, you would need antibiotics that can target non-dividing cells or a vaccine

"I think we need to step back from that and say that it's very likely that the organism is there as a commensal in an environment where it can live very easily because these people have abnormal immune systems, and it's not the bacteria itself causing the inflammation."

M Para is a commensal now? It causes diseases in tens of mammals including primates.

Those "abnormal immune systems" actually show susceptibility to mycobacteria, in fact they show inability to control intracellular pathogens.

How can you acknowledge that people with crohn's disease have this susceptbility while at the same time be so dismissive of potential causality.

""The incidence of Crohn's disease is lower in rural communities than in urban communities, so if it was just farm related we would expect to see farmers getting Crohn's more than other people, and that doesn't not occur. "

What a horrible conclusion, this isn't the case for many E Coli outbreaks, why would this automatically be the case for M Para.

 

[kiny]

Maybe someone should feed Warwick Selby a steak of a cow who has paratuberculosis since he's absolutely convinved it's not related to crohn's disease, I'm sure many scientists would want to see this, how about it?

 

[DustyKat]

I met Prof Selby when Matt was in RPA. Nice enough bloke but naturally we didn’t get into the nitty gritty of the cause of Crohn’s.

Our vet on the other hand is very interested in Ovine Johne’s disease and the link with Crohn’s. We have had a couple of very interesting conversations about it.

We reside in a rural area in which the main primary industry is sheep.

Dusty. :sheep:

 

[kiny]

The head of the IDF microbiology committee, Ireland-based Dr Kieran Jordan says it comes up every year at conferences, but again and again MAP is dismissed as a human health problem.

"MAP in milk is not a priority concern in the dairy industry because it's considered that pasteurisation destroys any that are present in milk"

Dr Kieran Jordan should lose his job for lying, everyone knows it survives pasteurisation.

Even if his lie was right, which it's not, since it's a pure lie, mycobacteria antigens, dead or alive are able to cause immune responses. It needs to be removed from the food chain right now, that people are so dismissive of this while people with crohn's disease are going through surgeries and losing their intestine is disgusting, you should be ashamed.

The removal of PTB positive animals has never been motivated by compassion for people with crohn's disease, it's purely to curb losses farmers encounter as a result of lowered milk production.

Unbelievable ignorance.

 

[nogutsnoglory]

I think the article makes an interesting point that we can't suggest the bacteria directly causes IBD, it might play a role but dairy farmers and families would have much higher rates rates of the disease if it were the case.

 

[kiny]

I think the article makes an interesting point that we can't suggest the bacteria directly causes IBD.

The article is dismissive, not unbiased, which is something else.

It didn't make any interesting points whatsoever, in fact it said a lot of things that are untrue.

 

[kiny]

dairy farmers and families would have much higher rates rates of the disease if it were the case.

Not necessarily, many zoonotic pathogens cause disease in humans but farmers are not more susceptible to them because they live close to the animals.

Like I already said, many outbreaks of E Coli and other bacteria do not correlate with increased indices of farmers getting sick, quite the opposite sometimes.

Besides, arguments like that are ridiculous, it's a counterargument that is hard to prove or disprove and discussions like that do not help anyone. You can go back and forth all day like that. You would need to account for genetic susceptibility too, and the fact onset of disease in animals is much later than infection.

The article had half of the things wrong, which is why those people who said those things should come out and say they are wrong or go do something else in their lives instead of causing controversy over progress.

Anyway, if anyone wants to discuss that stuff go do it in another thread please, we've been over this 500 times and those arguments are not worth discussing, it doesn't help anyone, it should be looked at unbiased and research should be focused on a solution, not bickering about things no one can prove.

Let it die instead of bumping it, it's full of flawed arguments.

 

[Catherine]

There is more to this story than meet the eye

Queensland is currently trying be maintain their bovine johne disease free status. There are presently outbreaks in Queensland cattle with movement controls on the infected cattle in place.