[ad_1]
The Carroll County Health District was informed that two raccoons in the Sherrodsville area had tested positive for rabies.
CARROLLTON The Carroll County Health District was informed that two raccoons from the Sherrodsville area had tested positive for rabies.
On August 28, health district officials received a call from the Ohio Department of Health laboratory that a raccoon had tested positive for rabies. After heightened awareness in the Sherrodsville area, another resident submitted a second raccoon to the health district for testing.
The second raccoon was declared positive in the health district on Monday.
Both raccoons had fights with pets. The first was a raccoon who acted irrationally and hurt the dog of a family. The resident recovered the raccoon and sent it to the Ohio Department of Health for a rabies screening test. The second was an aggressive raccoon who attacked a domestic cat while he was sleeping on a porch.
Both incidents occurred in the village of Sherrodsville, close to each other.
These are the first confirmed cases of raccoon rabies reported in Carroll County to date.
A dead raccoon found in July in Warren Township, Tuscarawas County, was also tested positive for rabies. In response, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) began to trap raccoons and test them for the disease in Tuscarawas County.
The Carroll County General Health District will continue to work with the USDA's Division of Wildlife to conduct enhanced surveillance to obtain collections near areas where rabid raccoons have been found.
The health district asks residents to report to the health district any raccoons, skunks, foxes, coyotes, opossums or lynxes that are behaving strangely in the township of Orange and surrounding areas by calling 330-627 -4866, extension 1522.
To reduce the risk of rabies:
n Avoid contact with wild animals, sick or injured animals and animals you do not know.
n Avoid feeding stray cats, dogs and wild animals. Remove all pet food from the porches.
n Vaccination of domestic animals must be kept up to date and pets must not be allowed to move.
n Food and nesting sites or hiding places for wild animals should be removed from residential areas.
n Call your doctor and local health department if you are bitten by an animal. Immunizations against human rabies are effective at preventing rabies in humans.
n Call your veterinarian if your pet is fighting with a wild animal, especially a raccoon.
n Common signs of rabies in a raccoon or other wild animal include agitation, disorientation, excessive salivation, jittering when walking and biting, and breaking people or objects . Animals associated with rabies include bats, cats, dogs, ferrets, horses, cattle, raccoons, skunks and other mammals.
Source link
