B.C. to kill 25 deer to test for chronic wasting disease

The B.C. government says it will cull 25 deer in the Kootenay region to test for chronic wasting disease.

The Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship says two deer in the region tested positive for the disease earlier this year.

The ministry says the animals will be collected in a 10-kilometre area around where the two diseased animals were found.

It adds that wildlife experts will use the samples to determine if more animals have the condition.

Chronic wasting disease is a fatal infection caused by an abnormal protein called a prion. Prion diseases are a family of rare neurodegenerative disorders that can be found in both humans and animals, impairing brain function.

Perhaps the best known example isbovine spongiform encephalopathy, commonly referred to asmad cow disease.

The province says it has recently begun mandatory testing for chronic wasting disease of any deer, moose, elk and caribou killed on B.C. roads, and it has restricted how carcasses can be transported and disposed of around the area where it was first detected.

The ministry says it is working with the Tobacco Plains Indian Band to collect the samples, permitting the band to collect 20 mule deer and five male white tailed deer by the end of this month.