Kuru is one of the few spongiform diseases that affect humans. The incubation period can last up to twenty years before early signs show, and once the symptoms start, the infected human has only two years to live. The first case of Kuru was reported in what is now New Guinea, in the Fore tribe, who were cannibals. Whenever anyone in the Fore tribe died, they would perform sacred burial rituals for the dead individual. They would tear off all the limbs and separate all the organs and the brain. The men ate the muscles, which they thought would make them stronger, and the women and children ate the organs and the brain, which they thought would make them smarter. When scientists studied the tribe and their lifestyle, they noticed that the women and children died more frequently then the men. They discovered that this was because the women and children ate the brain of the dead person, and eating an infected person’s brain is an effective mode of transmission for Kuru. The three stages of Kuru include the ambulant stage in which the infected person walks unsteadily, shivers, and has trouble speaking. In the sedentary stage, they begin to lose the ability to walk, lose control of muscles, and often burst out laughing for no reason. Finally, in the terminal stage, they are unable to sit upright, they move uncontrollably, have difficulty swallowing, and they develop ulcers.

Transmissible mink encephalopathy (TME) is a fatal spongiform disease that affects mink. Early symptoms are similar to BSE. More advanced symptom

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