Twenty-five wild deer tested positive for chronic wasting disease, of the 5,707 deer and 110 elk the Pennsylvania Game Commission tested during 2016.
All of the wild CWD-positive deer were in or near Disease Management Area 2 (DMA 2), the only area of the state where CWD has been detected in the wild. These 25 deer more than doubled the number of CWD-positive deer detected in DMA 2 from 2012 to 2015.
Through 2016, 47 wild deer tested positive for CWD in DMA 2.
Each year, the Game Commission collects CWD samples from hunter-harvested animals, road-kills, escaped captive cervids, and any cervid showing signs of CWD.
Since 2002, the Game Commission has tested over 61,000 deer for CWD. Although samples are collected from across the state, efforts were increased within the three Disease Management Areas (DMAs), which are areas in the state where CWD has been identified in wild and/or captive deer.
These include: DMA 1 in parts of Adams and York counties in which CWD was identified on a captive deer farm in 2012; DMA 2 in parts of Bedford, Blair, Somerset, Fulton, Cambria, and Huntingdon counties where CWD has been identified in multiple wild deer since 2012 and recently on three captive deer facilities; and DMA 3 in Jefferson and Clearfield counties where CWD was detected on two captive deer facilities in 2014.
The 25 new CWD-positive wild deer were part of 1,652 deer samples collected within DMA 2 during 2016. CWD-positive deer included 13 road-killed deer, 10 hunter-harvested deer, and two deer showing signs consistent with CWD.
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