MNR to launch massive rabies bait vaccination drop
Rabies incidents peaked in 2016 and declined since indicating the vaccine program is effective
HAMILTON — The Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry will spread more than 1.2 million raccoon rabies bait vaccines this summer in the Hamilton area in a $4-million offensive to try to eliminate the virus from the province.
Raccoon rabies incidents have dramatically declined in Hamilton since a peak of nearly 200 cases in 2016, and the MNRF believes there is an opportunity to deliver a knockout punch to the virus through continuing its vaccine bait program.
In addition to the bait drops, which will be spread by hand and aircraft through the summer, the MNRF will be setting up hundreds of traps in Hamilton and Burlington for raccoons and skunks.
The animals will then be vaccinated and released back into the wild.
So far this year, 10 raccoons and three skunks have tested positive for raccoon rabies. That compares to 48 raccoons and 23 skunks for all of last year, and 123 raccoons, 72 skunks and one fox for all of 2016, the peak year.
“The baiting program has directly contributed to the containment of the outbreak area and the decline in numbers of rabies cases,” says Rachel Gagnon, the MNR’s rabies science transfer specialist.
“With no rabies control actions, it was predicted that rabies would have spread from the current raccoon rabies outbreak area to Toronto and London by 2017, and past Barrie, Peterborough and Chatham by 2018.”
Baiting in the Golden Horseshoe area will begin in early July by staff on the ground and late August by aircraft.
But the strategy — which the ministry says has cost $8.6 million over the past three years — is being criticized by a wildlife advocacy group as a waste of money on a problem that is not nearly as serious as the ministry claims.
The Ontario Wildlife Coalition says it would be more cost effective to step up vaccinations of pets and farm animals.
The group notes the risk to humans is very small.
There has not been a rabies death in the province for more than five years. And in that case, rabies was contracted outside the country.
“The irrational fear that is promoted by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry doesn’t stand up to the facts,” says Donna DuBreuil of the wildlife coalition.
“Consider that although there have been tens of thousands of cases of raccoon-strain rabies in animals in North America in the last 50 years, most of which occurred in densely populated areas such as New York City, there has been only one human fatality and, even then, it was unclear how the Virginia resident contracted the disease.”
But the MNRF feels rabies outbreak needs to be controlled and eliminated and “it’s unlikely that a raccoon strain of rabies outbreak would disappear on its own.
Many U.S. states have sustained cases of raccoon strain rabies for over 40 years without any indication of these infections going away on their own,” said Gagnon.
In Hamilton, there have been two recorded cases of raccoon rabies spreading to cats. One took place last year and the other the year before.
The rabies outbreak first surfaced in December 2015 after a raccoon picked up by City of Hamilton Animal Services tested positive for the virus.
The raccoon had been involved in a skirmish inside an animal services van with two bullmastiff dogs named Lexus and Mr. Satan.
This led to stepped up rabies testing of diseased and dead raccoons that indicated the disease was spreading.
That led to the MNRF bait drops and a great decline in reported cases.