The Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) will expand its anti-rabies initiative in the El Paso region as part of the agency’s 32nd annual Oral Rabies Vaccination Program (ORVP). This year, the program will include both aerial and hand distribution of rabies vaccine baits to control the spread of rabies among wildlife.
Last year, DSHS increased aerial bait drops in far West Texas following the detection of the Arizona Fox rabies variant in New Mexico, which is now within 150 miles of the Texas border. In addition to ongoing aerial distribution, DSHS will distribute vaccine baits by hand in targeted areas around El Paso and in parts of Cameron, Hidalgo, Starr, and Willacy counties.
Kathy Parker, ORVP Director and Field Surveillance Lead, said: “Our mission is to vaccinate wildlife along the borders of Texas to maintain herd immunity against rabies and keep new or previously eliminated rabies variants from becoming established in any part of Texas. However, we continue to monitor all the counties of Texas for outbreaks and/or potential areas of rabies interest.”
Aerial bait distribution is scheduled to begin with flights from Alpine on January 16. Additional flights are planned from Del Rio International Airport starting January 21, depending on weather conditions. The vaccine bait—manufactured by Boehringer Ingelheim Animal Health USA Inc.—is enclosed in a small plastic packet coated with fish oil and fish-meal crumbles to attract wild canids such as coyotes and foxes.
According to DSHS, these baits are not harmful to pets, livestock or other wildlife. The ORVP project costs $2 million annually and receives funding from both the State of Texas and the United States Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service/Wildlife Services.
During this two-week operation, between six and nine flights per day are expected. Aircraft will fly at altitudes between 500 and 1,000 feet above ground level while dropping about 693,600 oral rabies vaccine baits at a density of 50 baits per square mile. The Border Maintenance Zone for ORVP covers 19 counties: El Paso, Hudspeth, Culberson, Jeff Davis, Presidio, Brewster, Pecos, Terrell, Val Verde, Kinney, Maverick, Zavala, Dimmit, Webb, Zapata, Starr, Hidalgo, Cameron and Willacy.
The program has played a key role in stopping domestic dog/coyote rabies variant transmission as well as that caused by the Texas gray fox variant. Before ORVP started more than three decades ago human deaths due to canine rabies occurred in Texas; many people exposed had to receive postexposure treatment.
In 1994 there were 122 confirmed animal cases involving the domestic dog/coyote variant statewide. The first air drop took place in South Texas in 1995; by 2000 animal cases had fallen to zero. Only two additional animal cases were reported—in 2001 and 2004—both near the Rio Grande River border area.
For gray fox variant control efforts began with air-dropped vaccines in West and Central Texas in 1996 after more than 240 animal cases were recorded statewide during 1995; that number dropped to zero by May 2009. A single case was confirmed in a cow in 2013 but expanded baiting led to no further cases since then.
Since ORVP’s launch no human cases attributable to these specific rabies virus variants have been confirmed within Texas.
