Rabies vaccine baits to be dropped in region
Photo of RABORAL V-RG baits coated sachet packets used for airplane and helicopter baiting in Southwest Virginia.
Beginning April 14, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, Wildlife Services, in cooperation with the Virginia Department of Health, will distribute oral rabies vaccine baits for wildlife in areas of Southwest Virginia and surrounding states. The ORV baits will be distributed from low-flying airplanes and helicopters. The smell of the ORV baits attracts targeted wild animals, such as raccoons, who eat the vaccine baits and then are protected against rabies.
The ORV bait distribution program in Virginia is part of management activities to prevent the westward movement of the rabies virus most often spread by raccoons. The bait distribution is expected to last approximately one week and will occur in parts of Bland, Giles, Grayson, Russell, Smyth, Tazewell, Washington, and Wythe counties and the cities of Bristol and Abingdon. Residents in these areas may see low-flying planes and helicopters dropping the ORV baits. The Virginia baiting is part of a larger ORV project occurring in April, during which approximately 1.7 million baits will be distributed in areas of southwest Virginia, western North Carolina, east Tennessee and north Georgia, including more than 230,000 ORV baits in Virginia.
Rabies is caused by a virus that infects the central nervous system in mammals and represents a serious public health concern. If exposures to the virus are not treated it is almost always fatal. Costs associated with detection, prevention and control of rabies exceed $600 million annually in the U.S. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 90 percent of reported rabies cases in the U.S. are in wildlife. People are urged not to make contact with or feed wildlife and to keep their pets’ rabies vaccinations current.
The vaccine baits have been proven safe in many species of animals, including domestic dogs and cats. Humans and pets cannot get rabies from contact with the baits but are asked to leave them undisturbed should they encounter them. If contact with baits occurs, immediately rinse the contact area with warm water and soap.
As part of the Wildlife Services’ National Rabies Management Program, ORV baits have been distributed in Virginia since 2002, as part of a larger effort to prevent the westward spread of raccoon rabies by creating a barrier along the Appalachian Mountains from the Canadian border to Alabama.
For more information about the National Rabies Management Program, please call
1-866-4USDA-WS (1-866-487-397) or visit https://www.aphis.usda.gov/national-wildlife-programs/rabies
