https://abcnews.go.com/amp/US/wireSt...state-96014304
Apparently, these people have never heard of prions.
Prions are almost indestructible, they can survive an autoclave, and even strong acids. Cooking meat that has prions in it will not deactivate them. I'll list several of the 'gotchas' that defenders of human composting tend to provide, and why they are not the 'gotcha' arguments they think they are:
''But! They will exclude people who have died from prion diseases from being composted!''
The incubation period for prion diseases, in humans, averages around 10 years. During the incubation period, prions slowly replicate in the body. However, during the incubation period, a person is asymptomatic. They could be in this incubation period for decades, and die for reasons unrelated to prions (such as a car accident). They would never have been diagnosed with a prion disease, as they were in the incubation period, and a diagnosis is made based on symptoms - yet they had prions replicating in their body. This ''gotcha'' argument fails to take into account the asymptomatic incubation time. Also, not all symptomatic prion infections are diagnosed.
''Composting removes 90% of prion proteins!'
Okay? If I say that a bleach removes 90% of COVID virions, would you feel reassured? I'm sure you wouldn't - that 10% could very well pose a threat to you, since like prions, viruses can replicate.
''In the year 1000, we did this all the time!''
Okay? Why do you think society was riddled with horrific diseases back then?
''You aren't eating the bodies. So you will be safe''
What makes you think the crops won't absorb the prions? Prions aren't magical. They're proteins.
''People eat beef and are fine!''
Sure. The risk can be eliminated from not eating beef, and for most people, beef is not all they eat in a day. If all non-meat food was grown from human compost, the risk would increase exponentially. It's equivalent to saying 'flu exists so you shouldn't mind COVID'.
''There's no risk of the crops taking up prions!''
If there's no risk, then why do the corporations claim that people who have died of prion diseases will be excluded from the composting process?
Prion - Wikipedia
''Prions in plants
In 2015, researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston found that plants can be a vector for prions. When researchers fed hamsters grass that grew on ground where a deer that died with chronic wasting disease (CWD) was buried, the hamsters became ill with CWD, suggesting that prions can bind to plants, which then take them up into the leaf and stem structure, where they can be eaten by herbivores, thus completing the cycle. It is thus possible that there is a progressively accumulating number of prions in the environment.[83][84]''
What's wrong with growing crops in ways that don't put us at risk of prion diseases, which are 100% fatal?
Apparently, these people have never heard of prions.
Prions are almost indestructible, they can survive an autoclave, and even strong acids. Cooking meat that has prions in it will not deactivate them. I'll list several of the 'gotchas' that defenders of human composting tend to provide, and why they are not the 'gotcha' arguments they think they are:
''But! They will exclude people who have died from prion diseases from being composted!''
The incubation period for prion diseases, in humans, averages around 10 years. During the incubation period, prions slowly replicate in the body. However, during the incubation period, a person is asymptomatic. They could be in this incubation period for decades, and die for reasons unrelated to prions (such as a car accident). They would never have been diagnosed with a prion disease, as they were in the incubation period, and a diagnosis is made based on symptoms - yet they had prions replicating in their body. This ''gotcha'' argument fails to take into account the asymptomatic incubation time. Also, not all symptomatic prion infections are diagnosed.
''Composting removes 90% of prion proteins!'
Okay? If I say that a bleach removes 90% of COVID virions, would you feel reassured? I'm sure you wouldn't - that 10% could very well pose a threat to you, since like prions, viruses can replicate.
''In the year 1000, we did this all the time!''
Okay? Why do you think society was riddled with horrific diseases back then?
''You aren't eating the bodies. So you will be safe''
What makes you think the crops won't absorb the prions? Prions aren't magical. They're proteins.
''People eat beef and are fine!''
Sure. The risk can be eliminated from not eating beef, and for most people, beef is not all they eat in a day. If all non-meat food was grown from human compost, the risk would increase exponentially. It's equivalent to saying 'flu exists so you shouldn't mind COVID'.
''There's no risk of the crops taking up prions!''
If there's no risk, then why do the corporations claim that people who have died of prion diseases will be excluded from the composting process?
Prion - Wikipedia
''Prions in plants
In 2015, researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston found that plants can be a vector for prions. When researchers fed hamsters grass that grew on ground where a deer that died with chronic wasting disease (CWD) was buried, the hamsters became ill with CWD, suggesting that prions can bind to plants, which then take them up into the leaf and stem structure, where they can be eaten by herbivores, thus completing the cycle. It is thus possible that there is a progressively accumulating number of prions in the environment.[83][84]''
What's wrong with growing crops in ways that don't put us at risk of prion diseases, which are 100% fatal?
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