Rabies cases down across the province affecting only bats, skunks and one cat

Farmers Forum staff

OTTAWA — The Canadian Food Inspection Agency counted 56 cases of rabies in Ontario animals in 2023, down from 61 a year earlier. The number of infected bats went up but the number of infected skunks went down and, for the first time since 2014, no raccoon rabies cases were recorded.

The carcasses of 49 bats (up from 35 in 2022) and six skunks (down from 20 in 2022) tested positive for the disease last year. Rabies turned up in no other wild species. A single cat was the only other case.

Ontario has averaged 55 rabies cases annually over the last five years. 2018 was the last year with over 100. The province used to have a much bigger problem with the deadly pathogen spread by bites and scratches. There were thousands of cases each year in the 1980s, with as many as 3,600 — mostly in raccoons — in 1986.

A vaccinated bait program launched in 1989 has proved highly successful at curtailing the virus. Rabies is otherwise 100 percent fatal to mammals — including infected humans if they go unvaccinated long enough after exposure. That’s a kill rate even more fearsome than Ebola.