By Catherine M. Brown

For decades Cape Cod had been in the enviable position of being free of rabies carried by terrestrial mammals. When raccoon rabies swept much of the East Coast, two things had kept the Cape safe: the Cape Cod Canal and a state-funded oral vaccine baiting program on the mainland side of it.

All of this changed on March 1, 2004, when a raccoon from Bourne, sent for routine testing because of aggressive behavior, tested positive. Since then animals in Sandwich, Mashpee, Barnstable, Yarmouth, and Dennis have tested positive for the rabies virus. Because we're a wildlife veterinary clinic in the Cape community, we help local, state, and federal agencies respond to this disease.

As staff veterinarian, I participate in meetings of the Cape Cod Rabies Task Force to discuss surveillance and control activities with those responsible for the vaccine baiting program: public health officials, local animal control and natural resource officers, and veterinarians from the Tufts School of Veterinary Medicine. Our clinic also answers the public's questions and fields reports of apparently sick animals.

Perhaps the most tangible support we have provided is assisting with sample preparation and submission to the state diagnostic laboratory. Town resources, already lean, have been further stretched by the response to rabies. We have worked to provide a cost-effective method for preparing animals who must be tested.

Although no one wished for rabies to cross the canal, it's been a community-building experience, one that reminds us that many committed individuals are working for the common good.

Catherine M. Brown, DVM, is the staff veterinarian at the Cape Wildlife Center. This article originally appeared in the Winter 2005 edition of Back to the Wild, the newsletter of the Cape Wildlife Center.