Scrapie and Kuru.

The suggestion that scrapie, an endemic disease of sheep, might be a myopathy, is rejected by the author, who writes to point out certain similarities between this disease and kuru, a neurodegenerative disease endemic in the Fore tribe of Guinea [this Bulletin, 1959, v. 56, 1283]. Both are endemic in well-defined populations, since scrapie occurs only in certain flocks, and kuru is confined to a single ethnic group, the Fore tribe. Each may develop some months after separation of the individual from his native stock, and each may appear in the progeny of union of affected with previously unaffected stock. In neither case has any recognized bacterial or viral agent been isolated, toxic and nutritional features are not Other CABI sites 