The Fore are a highland people of Papua New Guinea. The term highland is used to denote any mountainous region or elevated mountainous plateau. ...

In the early 1900s the prion disease Kuru (also known as laughing sickness due to the outbursts of laughter that mark its second phase) was discovered in the South Fore, a subgroup of around 8000 people living in the Okapa subdistrict (Eastern Highlands Province). // First flight by the Wright brothers, December 17, 1903. ... A prion (IPA: [1]  ) — short for proteinaceous infectious particle — (by analogy to virion) is a type of infectious agent. ... Kuru (also known as laughing sickness due to the outbursts of laughter that mark its second phase) was first noted in New Guinea in the early 1900s. ... A child laughing Laughter is an outward expression of amusement, mirth and at times, other emotions[1]. It may ensue (as a physiological reaction) from jokes, tickling and others. ... Eastern Highlands is a highlands province of Papua New Guinea. ...

The well known case of ritual acts of mortuary cannibalism of the Fore which resulted in the spread of the disease Kuru is well documented and not seriously questioned by modern anthropologists. A ritual is a set of actions, performed mainly for their symbolic value, which is prescribed by a religion or by the traditions of a community. ... This article is about eating ones own species. ... In epidemiology, an epidemic (from Greek epi- upon + demos people) is a disease that appears as new cases in a given human population, during a given period, at a rate that substantially exceeds what is expected, based on recent experience (the number of new cases in the population during a... Kuru (also known as laughing sickness due to the outbursts of laughter that mark its second phase) was first noted in New Guinea in the early 1900s. ... Initiation rite of the Yao people of Malawi Anthropology (from the Greek word , man or person) consists of the study of humanity (see genus Homo). ...

Kuru among the South Fore

Main article: Kuru (disease)

Upon the death of an individual, the maternal kin were responsible for the dismemberment of the corpse. The women would remove the arms and feet, strip the limbs of muscle, remove the brain and cut open the chest in order to remove internal organs. Kuru (also known as laughing sickness due to the outbursts of laughter that mark its second phase) was first noted in New Guinea in the early 1900s. ... Kinship and descent is one of the major concepts of cultural anthropology. ... Dismemberment is the act of cutting, tearing, pulling, wrenching or otherwise removing, the limbs of a living thing. ... With regard to living things, a body is the integral physical material of an individual, and contrasts with soul, personality and behavior. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Muscular system. ... In animals, the brain, or encephalon (Greek for in the head), is the control center of the central nervous system. ... In biology, an organ (Latin: organum, instrument, tool) is a group of tissues that perform a specific function or group of functions. ...

Shirley Lindenbaum, one of the early kuru researchers, states that kuru victims were highly regarded as sources of food, because the layer of fat on victims who died quickly resembled pork. Women also were known to feed morsels - such as human brain and various parts of organs - to their children and the elderly (Lindenbaum, 1979). Fats consist of a wide group of compounds that are generally soluble in organic solvents and largely insoluble in water. ... Two halves of a pig being delivered Pork is the meat taken from pigs. ... For the Smashing Pumpkins song, see 1979 (song). ...

It is currently believed that kuru was transmitted among the South Fore through participation in such cannibalism, although opportunistic infection through wounds when removing infectious tissue from the corpse can be assumed to be another cause, as not all cases can be explained by ingestion of infectious tissue. Opportunistic infections are infections caused by organisms and usually do not cause disease in a person with a healthy immune system, but can affect people with a poorly functioning or suppressed immune system. ... Superficial bullet wounds In medicine, a wound is a type of physical trauma wherein the skin is torn, cut or punctured (an open wound), or where blunt force trauma causes a contusion (a closed wound). ... An infection is the detrimental colonization of a host organism by a foreign species. ... Biological tissue is a collection of interconnected cells that perform a similar function within an organism. ...

Though the Fore would not eat those who had apparently died of disease, and so did not so easily catch other diseases via cannibalism, they believed that kuru was a mental affliction caused by a curse rather than a physical disease.

The kuru epidemic reached its height in the 1960s. Between 1957 and 1968, over 1100 of the South Fore died from kuru. The vast majority of victims among the South Fore were women. In fact, eight times more women than men contracted the disease. It later affected small children and the elderly at a high rate as well. The 1960s decade refers to the years from January 1, 1960 to December 31, 1969, inclusive. ... Year 1957 (MCMLVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1968 (MCMLXVIII) was a leap year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1968 calendar). ...

Lindenbaum and Vincent Zigas worked among the South Fore in New Guinea trying to identify and catalog the symptoms and possible behavior causing the disease. Daniel Carleton Gajdusek also traveled there in 1957, to study disease patterns in indigenous and isolated populations (Gajdusek, 1996). Lindenbaum, Zigas, and Gajdusek were all crucial to explaining the specifics of kuru to the rest of the world. Daniel Carleton Gajdusek in 1976 when he won the Nobel Prize in Medicine. ... The term indigenous peoples has no universal, standard or fixed definition, but can be used about any ethnic group who inhabit the geographic region with which they have the earliest historical connection. ... Species with a small population size are subject to a higher chance of extinction because their small population size makes them more vulnerable to genetic drift, resulting in stochastic variation in their gene pool, their demography and their environment. ... 1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ...

The disease all but disappeared with the termination of cannibalism in New Guinea.