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Thursday, November 27, 1997

Health officials plan new vaccine drop

By ANNA M. TINSLEY / Scripps Howard Austin Bureau

AUSTIN - State health officials are gearing up for a renewed attack in Central-West Texas against the deadly rabies epidemic in gray fox.

Texas Department of Health workers will drop more than 1 million pellets containing oral vaccine for infected gray foxes in January in a 52-county drop area, which includes a number of area counties.

Since 1995, millions of vaccine-laced baits have been dropped throughout Texas - with much success in fighting the virus, said Gayne Fearneyhough, director of the Oral Rabies Vaccination Project for the health department.

Fewer cases have been reported since the program began and health officials say they hope to rid Texas of the gray fox rabies strain in three to four years.

"We have kept rabies in gray fox from spreading, but we still have work to do," Fearneyhough said. "We still have large areas not treated so far. We hope to expand the program and address the problem."

Rabies, transmitted by the bite of an infected animal, is treatable in humans but fatal once it enters the nervous system, which takes several weeks or months after exposure.

"We aren't doing this just to save (animals)," Fearneyhough said. "We're doing it to save people."

In 1995, 188 cases of gray fox rabies were reported in Central-West Texas compared with 57 in 1996 and 14 by October of this year, according to health department reports.

"This program has shown fairly dramatic results," Fearneyhough said.

For years, officials have waged a double-pronged attack on two strains of the disease - against coyotes in South Texas and gray foxes in Central and West Texas.

More baits were dropped in South Texas, as health officials worked to push back the northward spread of rabies. Now, the coyote strain has nearly been eliminated and officials are turning their attention to the gray fox strain.

Initially, baits were dropped in Central-West Texas to form a barrier around known rabies cases, to keep the disease from spreading to animals in nearby counties.

"We kept it from spreading, but we haven't dropped the vaccine in the central core area," Fearneyhough said. "We still have large areas not treated so far but we hope to expand the program and address that.

"The 1998 program will finish the drops in South Texas and we will go back into the fox area," he said. "We moved the perimeter in about five miles to try to close the strain around Central-West Texas."

Officials are now gearing up for their next airdrop, which will begin Jan. 6 in South Texas and then move to Central-West Texas.

About 1 million baits will be dropped in 52 area counties.

Overall, the drops should take between five and six weeks, Fearneyhough said.

Forty-seven percent of gray foxes from West-Central Texas have eaten at least one bait since the program began, Fearneyhough said.

During the airdrops, the Raboral V-RG vaccine, enclosed in a plastic bag and tucked inside hollow dog-food-like bait, is dropped from airplanes. The vaccine, developed by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was dropped in Texas for the first time in 1995.

Environmental and health risks associate with the vaccine-laced baits are low, officials said. When an animal eats the vaccine, it becomes immunized.

Each year, the air drops cost about $4 million. About 75 percent of the cost is for vaccine. The rest is for airplanes and workers to help drop the vaccine.

After this next drop, health officials will have spent about $16 million in fighting the rabies virus. But health department reports show if the disease hadn't been treated, rabies-related health care costs for humans would have reached about $63 million by the year 2004.

"Anything successful in disease control is costly," said Leon Russell, a veterinary professor who specializes in rabies at Texas A&M University in College Station. "The benefit is well justified.

"Texas is leading the way with the fight against rabies," he said. "If problems come up in other states, I think they will look at Texas and follow our example on fighting rabies."

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Partial list of counties where rabies vaccine will be dropped in West-Central Texas zone

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Brewster

Brown

Coleman

Comanche

Crane

Eastland

Erath

Fisher

Gillespie

Glasscock

Howard

Jones

Lampasas

Llano

Mills

Mitchell

Nolan

Pecos

Presidio

San Saba

Scurry

Shackelford

Stephens

Taylor

Upton

Ward

Source: Texas Department of Health