           Home > News > News Item |
||||||
 |
News Release RI Department of Environmental Management 235 Promenade Street, Providence, RI 02908 (401) 222-2771 TDD/(401) 222-4462
DEM ADOPTS PERMANENT REGULATIONS TO KEEP CHRONIC WASTING DISEASE OUT OF RHODE ISLAND PROVIDENCE - The Department of Environmental Management has filed permanent regulations that ban the importation of cervids - such as deer and elk - and certain of their parts from states where Chronic Wasting Disease has been found, as well as from areas bordering those states, and forbid the release into the wild of any captive or wild cervid. The action has been taken in an effort to prevent the introduction of Chronic Wasting Disease into the state, and makes permanent the current ban, first enacted 18 months ago through temporary emergency measures.Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) is a progressive neurological disease that is fatal to deer and elk. It is not known to pose any risk to people or animals other than cervids. The disease has been found in wild deer and elk in limited areas of Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, Wisconsin, South Dakota, Kansas, New Mexico, Wisconsin, and Illinois, and in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. It has also been identified in farmed elk in Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Kansas, and in Canada on Saskatchewan and Alberta farms. The new Rhode Island regulations also prohibit feeding and baiting of white-tailed deer. Baiting deer has always been illegal; the ban on feeding was first adopted in emergency regulations since feeding is highly associated with disease transmission. Several exceptions are allowed such as some bona fide agricultural practices and the incidental feeding of deer that sometimes occurs at raised backyard birdfeeders. Rhode Island's regulations stipulate that an area must be CWD-free for seven years before cervids from that area can be imported into Rhode Island. The regulations also stipulate that those who hunt in areas where Chronic Wasting Disease has been found must remove all nervous tissue - brain and spinal cord - from deer and elk meat before bringing it back to Rhode Island, making into law a precaution hunters have been following since the spread of Chronic Wasting Disease. Although the method of transmission is not fully understood, disease experts believe Chronic Wasting Disease is passed through direct animal-to-animal contact and possibly by indirect contact with the highly resistant CWD prion found in nerve tissue. Prions have not been found in muscle tissue. DEM has joined much of the country in conducting a systematic Chronic Wasting Disease surveillance program, and is assisted by hunters who donate heads of deer harvested during Rhode Island deer hunting seasons for testing. Funding from the federal government, including the US Department of Agriculture and the US Fish and Wildlife Service, is supporting this collaborative effort. Although there is currently no evidence that Chronic Wasting Disease is naturally transmissible to humans or to animals other than cervids, DEM continues to recommend that hunters follow simple precautions when dressing and preparing venison, such as wearing rubber gloves when dressing carcasses; boning out meat from the animal; minimally handling and not consuming the brain, spinal cord, eyes, spleen and lymph nodes; and washing hands and instruments thoroughly after field dressing in completed. The regulations, and a brochure on Chronic Wasting Disease, can be found on DEM's website, www.dem.ri.gov, by clicking on "Publications/Regulations". For additional information on Chronic Wasting Disease, visit the Chronic Wasting Disease Alliance website at www.cwd-info.org. -30- |
|||||
For General Information 222-6800 • After Hours Emergencies 222-3070 • Disclaimer
rev. 2/17/04