Chronic wasting disease found in deer shot north of Chester

Havre Daily News staff

Chronic wasting disease now has been found in a deer harvested in north-central Montana, Fish, Wildlife and Parks said in a release this afternoon.

The disease, a progressive, fatal disease affecting the central nervous system of mule deer, white-tailed deer, elk and moose, was confirmed in a mule deer buck shot by a hunter Nov. 12 north of Chester, FWP said in the release.

It is the fifth case of CWD found in Montana this fall, with the other four found south of Billings.

This is the first year the disease has been found in Montana, although the disease exists in wild deer herds in Wyoming, North and South Dakota, Saskatchewan and Alberta.

FWP assembled a response team to respond to the detection of CWD near Billlings and now is putting together a team to respond to the detection north of Chester, the release said.

Such an incident command team defines an initial response area around where an infected animal was harvested, and may recommend a special CWD hunt to collect enough samples to determine disease prevalence and distribution, the release said. The specifics of this hunt would be determined by the incident command team.

Though there is no evidence CWD is transmissible to humans, it is recommended to never ingest meat from animals that appear to be sick or are known to be CWD positive. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends hunters who have harvested a deer, elk, or moose from a known CWD-infected area have the animal tested prior to consuming it.

Watch for more in Wednesday's edition of the Havre Daily News.