September 26, 2019
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The CDC is urging hunters to use protection when field-dressing deer because the animals can transmit bacteria that causes tuberculosis.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is encouraging hunters to take precautions when field-dressing deer because the animals can transmit bacteria that causes tuberculosis to humans.
A 77-year-old Michigan likely contracted TB in 2017 after field-dressing a deer, according to a report issued by the CDC. The man had no known exposure to other people with TB and had not traveled outside of the United States.
The CDC encouraged hunters to use personal protection equipment while field-dressing deer. The man may have contracted the disease by inhaling aerosols while removing a diseased viscera.
The man had regularly hunted and field-dressed deer in a four-county portion of Michigan's lower peninsula for 20 years. Only about 1.4 percent of deer tested from the area had tested positive for Mycobacterium bovis, which can cause TB in livestock. But that was considerably than higher elsewhere in the state.
Two similar cases occurred in Michigan in 2002 and 2004. The risk of deer transmitting M. Bovis to humans is understudied, according to the CDC said.
