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The press release below may be outdated and no longer applicatory, but is
listed here for your reference to help you better serve our community
along side Lewis County Public Health. Should you have any questions or
concerns about any of these releases, please contact us immediately.
NEWS RELEASE
June 26, 2008
For more information contact
Carol
Paluck, Interim Director and Supervising Public Health Nurse at 376-5453.
Two town of Leyden teens are being treated to
prevent the development of rabies after they attempted to pull porcupine
quills out of a raccoon’s snout on Thursday June 26, 2008. Although they
attempted to handle the animal with a blanket over it, the raccoon bit one
of the teens through the blanket. The other teen is being treated because
the drooling raccoon may have contaminated his face. Quills in a
raccoon’s snout virtually always mean a raccoon is rabid because a healthy
raccoon avoids porcupines. The raccoon was captured and destroyed. The
Lewis County Sheriff’s Department provided transport of the raccoon
specimen to the NYS Department of Health Rabies Laboratory for testing.
Lewis County Public Health received the report that the test was positive
for rabies.
Now that school is out and the weather is warm,
parents are cautioned to instruct their children to avoid wild animals.
If a wild animal approaches people, this is not normal, and children
should be taught to report this to an adult. Raccoons, skunks, foxes and
bats are the animals which are most frequently found to have rabies in New
York State. People should avoid these mammals.
It is illegal for anyone but a licensed wildlife
rehabilitator to have as a pet raccoon, or be harboring a raccoon or any
other wild animals that can transmit rabies to people. Anyone holding or
keeping a raccoon or other wild animal should be reported to the New York
State Department of Environmental Conservation Office in Lowville or
Watertown.
The best
way to protect against rabies is to have pet dogs and cats vaccinated.
New York State Law requires all dogs and cats to be vaccinated when they
are 3 months old, one year later and every three years thereafter. Pet
vaccination protects people because pets are the mammals with which people
have most frequent contact.
For more
information about rabies call Lewis County Public Health at 376-5453 or go
to our website: www.lewiscountypublichealth.com.
