Active Listening Skills in the Healthcare Environment

What You Need to Know About Mad Cow Disease

What You Need to Know About Mad Cow Disease When it comes to Mad Cow Disease, its difficult to separate fact from fiction and hard data from supposition. Part of the problem is political and economical, but a lot of it is based in biochemistry. The infectious agent that causes Mad Cow Disease isnt easy to characterize or destroy. Plus, it can be hard to sort through all of the different acronyms used for the scientific and medical terms. Heres a summary of what you need to know: What is Mad Cow Disease Mad Cow Disease (MCD) is Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), except that Mad Cow Disease is much easier to pronounce!The disease is caused by prions.Prions can cross between species (although not all species get diseases from them). Cattle get the disease from eating infected food, such as feed that contains rendered parts of infected sheep. Yes, cattle are grazing creatures, but their diets may be supplemented with protein from another animal source.Cattle dont immediately get sick from eating the prions. It can take months or years for Mad Cow Disease to develop. Tell Me About Prions Simply put, prions are proteins that can cause disease.Prions arent alive, so you cant kill them. Proteins can be inactivated by denaturing them (e.g., extreme heat, certain chemical agents), but these same processes usually destroy food, so there isnt an effective method to decontaminate beef.Prions naturally occur in your body, so they are not recognized as foreign and dont stimulate the immune system. They have the potential to cause disease, but wont automatically harm you.Disease-causing prions may physically contact normal prions, altering them so that they too can cause disease. The mechanism of prion action is not well understood. How Do You Get Mad Cow Disease? Technically, you cant get Mad Cow Disease or Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy, because you arent a cow. People who get a disease from exposure to the prion develop a variant of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) known as vCJD. You can develop CJD randomly or from a genetic mutation, completely unrelated to Mad Cow Disease. MCD, BSE, CJD, and vCJD are all members of a class of diseases called transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSE).It appears that some people are genetically pre-disposed toward developing TSEs. This means that the risk of contracting the disease is not equal for all people. Some people may be more at risk; others may have a natural protection.CJD occurs randomly in about one out of a million people.The inherited version of CJD accounts for about 5-10% of all cases.vCJD may be passed on by tissue implants and theoretically by blood transfusion or blood products. Beef Safety It is not known how much beef has to be eaten to cause infection.Nerve tissue (e.g., brain) and various ground meat products and by-products carry the infectious agents.Muscle tissue (meat) may carry the infectious agent.Rendering or processing foods can (with difficulty) destroy prions.Normal cooking will not destroy prions. What Does the Disease Do in People? TSEs, including vCJD, kill neurons in the brain.The diseases have a long incubation period (months to years), so there is a long time between the point of infection and contracting the actual disease.The death of neurons causes the brain to appear like a sponge (areas of open space between groups of cells).All TSEs are presently incurable and fatal.vCJD affects younger patients than CJD (average age 29 years for vCJD, as opposed to 65 years for CJD) and has a longer duration of illness (14 months as opposed to 4.5 months). How Can I Protect Myself? Avoid eating parts of the cow that are likely to carry the infection (brain, ground products, which could include hot dogs, bologna, or certain luncheon meats).Remember that it is possible that muscle may carry the disease, although it would carry the prion in much lower quantities. Its your choice whether to eat beef or not.Milk and milk products are believed to be safe. Be Careful What You Eat Dont eat processed meat from an unknown source. The manufacturer listed on the label is not necessarily the source of the meat. Mad Cow Disease affects nervous tissue. Until it is known whether only the central nervous system (brain and spinal cord) or whether the peripheral nervous system (e.g., nerves that are in muscles) are affected, there may be risk involved in eating any parts of infected beef. That is not to say that eating beef is unsafe! Eating steaks, roasts, or burgers known to have been made from uninfected herds is perfectly safe. However, it may be harder to know the origins of the meat in processed meat products.

Early Islam and Islam Today Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Early Islam and Islam Today - Essay Example The culture and beliefs of Muslims are also discussed. This paper also presents a brief overview on both historical and modern Islam, worldwide and in America. Culture and Beliefs of Muslims Islam is a monotheistic religion and Muslims believe in the oneness of god. They have five basic principles that they call the â€Å"pillars† of Islam (Shepard, 2009). The first pillar is that of the Shahada, which is the declaration that there is only one god and prophet Muhammad is his messenger. The second pillar is the Salah, i.e. prayer, which is performed five times a day. The third pillar is the Zakah, i.e. charity for the poor. The fourth pillar is the Sawm, which means fasting. Muslims fast during the entire month of Ramazan, a holy month of the Islamic calendar. It is believed that the Quran, the word of God (Allah), began to be revealed to Prophet Muhammad by angel Gabriel during this month. The fifth and final pillar of Islam is Hajj, or pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca, at least once in a lifetime (Shepard, 2009). Muhammad, who is believed by Muslims to be a prophet and messenger of Allah, founded Islam. Islam abolished the practice of polytheism, which was the religion of pagan Arabia, and introduced the concept of unity or oneness of God. According to Muhammad’s teachings, there are certain tenets and standards of living, ethics and polity, as described in the Quran, the holy book of Muslims, to be followed by Muslims, failing which they would face penalty both in this life and in the afterlife. Muslims have faith in the Judgment Day, when all humans will be judged for their deeds and will be sent to hell or heaven based on their doings. Muslims place a great significance on the conservation of women’s modesty, and so, women are asked to cover themselves by veils. They are not allowed to reveal themselves to other men except their husbands and close kin. Women and men are segregated in their social gatherings. Although it is widely be lieved that Muslim women are suppressed, it is believed to be the wrongdoing of men themselves rather than Islam, as Islam preaches equality of both men and women (Ezzati, 2002). Muslims are forbidden to consume pork and alcohol (Shepard, 2009). While monogamy is the common practice among Muslims, polygamy is legal and permitted by Islam (Shepard, 2009). While Muslim women are allowed only one husband, Muslim men can have a maximum of four wives only if they can treat all their wives equally. The Arabs made great scientific and cultural progress with the advent of Islam (Shepard, 2009). Origin and Expansion of Islam Islam has many universal elements that appealed to all cultures and religions outside Arabia (Stearns et al., 2004). This led to the acceptance of Islam and conversion to Islam by people of other religions such as Christianity, Judaism, etc. Following the death of Muhammad, his followers set up a caliphate in order to maintain political stability among the Arabs (Hemming er, 1997). Abu-Bakr was made the first caliph and military exhibition was used to gain the caliph’s authority over Arabia (Hemminger, 1997). Under his caliphate, the Arabs overtook Persian and Byzantine forces. He was succeeded by Umar, who became the second caliph and under whose reign, many other neighboring empires were conquered. By 637 CE, Ctesiphon (Persia’