The State : Rabies Alert Possible in S.F.

San Francisco may have to be declared a rabies zone, requiring the vaccination of 100,000 dogs. The warning by Dr. Denny Constantine, public health veterinarian for the state, came after it was determined that a fatally inflicted boy was not bitten by a rabid bat in Sonoma County as first thought. Constantine said he would wait for final laboratory tests before asking the Northern California rabies advisory committee to declare San Francisco a rabies zone. “I don’t see that we can do anything else, really,” he said. “If we don’t have any evidence he was infected outside San Francisco, I think we have to assume he was infected there. As far as I’m concerned, the regulations say San Francisco should be declared a rabies zone.” Michael Ancheta, 13, of San Francisco died Dec. 15 in a hospital. A rabid bat was blamed because the boy and his classmates had seen a bat during an earlier nature trip to Sonoma County.