Cases of rabies decline in Western Pennsylvania
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Rabies case numbers in Allegheny County and throughout Western Pennsylvania are declining due in part to an 8-year-old vaccination baiting program, according to state and county agencies.
Agriculture Secretary Dennis Wolff said the annual oral rabies vaccination baiting program under way in 14 western counties has helped control rabies in wild animals and reduced the number of reported rabies cases by about 20 percent in the last six years.
"Controlling the spread of rabies in wild animals is essential to human and domestic animal health," Mr. Wolff said.
In Allegheny County, where the Health Department distributed about 200,000 bait packages during the week of Aug. 10, the number of rabid raccoons has been trending downward.
Only two rabid raccoons and four rabid bats have been identified in Allegheny County so far this year. In 2002, the first year of the program, the county identified 32 rabid animals, including 23 raccoons.
"This has really been a successful program in reducing the interaction between raccoons and people and their pets," said Guillermo Cole, a county Health Department spokesman. "There's clearly a downward trend in our numbers."
More than 90 percent of the reported rabies cases in the United States are found in wildlife, with raccoons making up more than half of that total. Although the primary focus of the program is to vaccinate raccoons, other animals including dogs, cats, cattle, horses, skunks, groundhogs, coyotes and foxes benefit through reduced exposure to the rabies virus.
Since early August, trained employees have been spreading vaccine bait packs by hand in densely populated areas of northwestern Pennsylvania. Hand-baiting will also take place in many southwestern Pennsylvania counties this week. Beginning Sept. 2, low-flying aircraft will drop bait in sparsely populated areas.
The liquid rabies vaccine is contained in a sealed plastic package containing smelly fishmeal bait that is attractive to raccoons and other wild animals. When an animal punctures the sealed plastic package, the pink-colored vaccine is released into its mouth.
The vaccine contains only a small, non-infective portion of the rabies virus. The bait does not pose an immediate health risk to humans or pets, but anyone who finds the bait should avoid handling it unless found where children or pets play. Bait can be moved or disposed of with gloves.
The USDA's Wildlife Serves division has done density studies to find an estimated number of animals in each county so they can determine how many baits are needed in each area. The studies showed that Allegheny County has a significantly higher number of raccoons compared to most other counties.
The program, which has a multi-state focus, covers all or parts of Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Butler, Crawford, Erie, Fayette, Greene, Indiana, Lawrence, Mercer, Venango, Washington and Westmoreland counties.
Six agencies are partnering with Wildlife Services for this program, including the state departments of Agriculture and Health, the Pennsylvania Game Commission, Erie and Allegheny health departments and the Centers for Disease Control.
For more information about the oral rabies vaccination baiting program, visit www.agriculture.state.pa.us.
First Published August 27, 2009 12:00 am
