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WESTNILEVIRUS-L@cornell.edu (WESTNILEVIRUS-L), Cox@vet.k-state.edu
Subject: RE: Cleaning of game birds
Date: Tue, 15 Oct 2002 15:19:07 -0400
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When you are handing thousands of infected animals, the numbers start
working aganst you.

-----Original Message-----
From: Ward Stone [mailto:wbstone@gw.dec.state.ny.us]
Sent: Tuesday, October 15, 2002 2:00 PM
To: Dominick.Ninivaggi@co.suffolk.ny.us; WESTNILEVIRUS-L@cornell.edu;
Cox@vet.k-state.edu
Subject: RE: Cleaning of game birds

In the last four years, we have had several nicks and cuts related to
the dissection of the thousands of birds we have necropsied.
One cut resulted in a technician acquiring a West Nile Virus
infection.
That undoubtedly played a role in my thinking. This year, we have over
1,200 confirmed cases we have dissected and a few hundred more are in
progress.

Ward B. Stone
NYS Wildlife Pathologist
108 Game Farm Road
Delmar, NY 12054
(518) 478-3032

>>> "Ninivaggi, Dominick" <Dominick.Ninivaggi@co.suffolk.ny.us>
10/15/02 12:40PM >>>
These are very strict precautions indeed. Another reason why this may
be a
good idea for your lab is that the next exotic pathogen that reaches NY
is
likely to pass through your lab before anyone knows about it. I
understand
that a lab worker was infected with WNV a year or two ago in NY. Are
these
precautions related to that incident?

-----Original Message-----
From: Ward Stone [mailto:wbstone@gw.dec.state.ny.us]
Sent: Tuesday, October 15, 2002 11:13 AM
To: WESTNILEVIRUS-L@cornell.edu; Cox@vet.k-state.edu
Subject: Re: Cleaning of game birds

In New York, we have long recommended that sportsmen wear disposable
gloves while dressing gamebirds, and as soon as possible. They should
thoroughly wash their hands with soap and water. Also, the meat
should
not be handled with bare hands during preparation for the table. The
contamination of scratches and cuts with WNV containing blood and
tissue
is a probable route to WNV infection. Knives and other tools used on
processing gamebirds are disinfected with a 5% household bleach and
then
washed in soapy water and rinsed. Work areas can also be disinfected
with the dilute bleach.

This year's late summer and fall, we have had a high prevalence of WNV
in birds (especially crows and blue jays). Recently, more than half
of
them submitted for WNV monitoring have been positive. This has lead
to
a change in our necropsy room dissection technique. It is inevitable
that with thousands of birds being necropsied for WNV monitoring,
there
will be rare scalpel cuts through gloves, and occasional bone
splinters
entering the flesh of the pathologist or technician. We are now
wearing
stainless steel mesh gloves to reduce that risk. One or two latex
gloves are worn beneath the stainless steel mesh glove and two more
over
it. This greatly slows dissections, but they make a safer setting in
the necropsy room. This is important, since we have no vaccine yet
available, and one has to rely primarily on one's immune system for
the
outcome of a WNV infection.

>>> "Judy Cox" <Cox@vet.k-state.edu> 10/11/02 02:01PM >>>
As a veterinarian in the middle of the Kansas-Nebraska WNV outbreak, I
have been asked several times about the safety of cleaning game birds
(it is already dove season here and we haven't had frost yet). Later
seasons will open on pheasant, quail, and prairie chicken (although
usually by that time we will have had a good killing frost some weeks
ahead of it).

Are there any definite recommendations? Since the hunter does skin,
gut, and chop the head off the birds?

Thank you,

Judy H. Cox, DVM, MS, DACVIM
Associate Professor, Equine Medicine
Dept. of Clinical Sciences
Kansas State University
Cox@vet.k-state.edu
(785) 532-5700
Received on Thu Oct 17 11:17:53 2002