Just for clarity - my last line there was me being facetious!

I was under the impression that even boiling or bleaching did little to kill prions? I seem to recall that even autoclaving surgey equipment did nothing to them, so they had to be thrown?

Otherwise, yes - there're lands of opportunity in the science of protein un/folding.. but as much, there's scope for naughtiness too.

Seems to me like this level of tech - or, at least - that which may be available in this domain over the next 50 years, could be one of those existential Great Selector/Filter events that biological civilisations might face over their evolution.