Science / Medicine : Bat-Fox Rabies Link Found

A recent discovery that rabid bats transmitted the deadly disease to four gray foxes in two New York counties is shedding new light on how rabies may be spread among wildlife, raising the possibility that new ways to combat wildlife rabies can result.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control said the study of wildlife rabies cases in New York showed that a cluster of four rabies cases in gray foxes was apparently the result of contact with infected bats.

Jean Smith, a research microbiologist at the disease control center, said scientists still do not know the full significance of the bat rabies found in the foxes. “We’re just in the process of accumulating enough cases so that we can determine the importance of this.”

The health agency said in its rabies summary that there were 5,551 cases of animal rabies reported in the United States in 1986, close to the 5,606 reported the previous year. Ninety-one percent of all cases were in wild animals.