The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is warning that exposure to rabies appears to be on the rise across the country.
From July through August, the agency received 17% more rabies-related inquiries than in the same time period last year, including reports of mass exposure events, according to an official CDC health advisory published Thursday.
During that time, the CDC said, it also received reports from at least eight state health departments about an increase in administering post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) care for rabies, PEP administration errors or both.
This summer has seen a mass exposure event in North Carolina, where nearly 300 people were exposed to baby goats with rabies from a mobile petting zoo that made at least 10 visits between July 28 and August 27, including to assisted living centers and a back-to-school bash. The state health department recommended post-exposure prophylaxis to help prevent infection for 213 people.
Since July, “multiple United States jurisdictions have reported local increases in human rabies exposures involving known rabies vectors or animals in which rabies is less commonly reported,” the CDC warned in its new advisory.
