COVID DEER?

 Last night Shewho told me the New York Times and NPR informed her that deer can have Covid-19 and I should be careful. Huh? What exactly does that mean? I asked. Once pressed Shewho admitted that the information was sketchy and she did not have the answers to my obvious questions about meat consumption, etc. I had spent the past two afternoons being cock-blocked by humans walking dogs during my hunt. Hoping to catch one of these big bucks filtering into a field of does, my efforts were stymied by strolling neighbors unconcerned with my efforts, as I sat in a tree watching them fuck up my hunt. I was in no mood to hear that gutting a deer or eating back-strap could now give me Corona Virus. WTF?

     So after overreacting to the "news"and getting testy with Shewho, I googled whitetail Covid. This so-called "pre-print," non-peer reviewed study is right up there with the classic National Enquirer articles "Benji has AIDS" and "Crackhead Squirrels of Tompkins Square Park." Here is a Forbes Magazine article:   "Anyone with decent Wifi, a computer, and opposable thumbs can upload a pre-print. So take any results from this study with a fanny pack full of salt.......The team from Penn State, University of Cambridge, University of Chicago, and Houston Methodist Hospital examined samples of retropharyngeal lymph nodes from a total of 283 deer, 151 of whom were free-living and 132 were in captivity..... retropharyngeal lymph nodes are lymph nodes behind your throat. The researchers searched the lymph node samples for evidence of SARS-CoV-2 genetic material (i.e., RNA) using RT-PCR. A little over a a third (33.2%) of all samples from September 2020 through January of 2021 were positive for SARS-CoV-2 RNA. Narrowing the time window to Nov 23, 2020 through January 10, 2021, pushed this number even higher up to 82.5% with 80 of 97 having detectable SARS-CoV-2 RNA....Nevertheless, finding the virus in deer shouldn’t have been too surprising. There already have been cases of lions, tigers, cats, dogs, minks, and other animals getting infected with the Covid-19 coronavirus."

   This smacks of anti-gun, anti-hunting propaganda. If not the dreaded "fake news," this item was at least so ill-informed and lacking in hard data as to be basically worthless. I don't usually get my hunting information from Forbes, but in this case they at least put things in context. Minks and cats may carry Covid but you don't eat your cat or fur coat. No so-called journalist even mentioned if you could (or couldn't) get Covid from ingesting venison. It all reminds me of the early days of Lyme Disease, Radon and Hantavirus scares. People visiting me from the city eye-balled my mouse traps suspiciously and  duct taped their pant legs, too paranoid to venture out in grass above their shoes. If mouse shit, dirt basements and every tick I got on me while in the woods made me vulnerable to disease I would've croaked years ago. I'm anticipating emails with the NYTimes deer-Covid link attached coming soon from all my citiot friends.

      Cheeky is drooling in my beard and giving me butterfly kisses. Don't worry Cheeky I'm vaccinated and suspicious of everything. The alarmist NYTimes and NPR editors should be ashamed of themselves. I admit that I get most of my news from the usually reliable left of center PBS and NPR news outlets but maybe it's time for a Fox fix. This all smacks of a "time sensitive" item that fit the bill for a left of PETA agenda just before the gun opener. It went viral in no time. Nothing can be taken at face value these days. Check, check and double-check anything you read. Those deer are keeping their "social distance" quite well in my woods. I'll worry (or not) about catching Covid when I get one on the ground. Expect a study on Covid turkeys and the danger of infected  canned cranberry sauce in the coming weeks. Remember to microwave your mail and wash your hands like you have OCD. Let's stay safe out there. Extra salt on everything!