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JACKSON — The Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Lab confirmed a second case of Chronic Wasting Disease in a Warren County deer. It is the second confirmed case this hunting season and was found about a mile from the first confirmed CWD case in Warren County.

This confirmation comes days after Louisiana confirmed a suspect case of CWD in a deer in Tensas Parish close to the Mississippi River. To date, 115 deer have been confirmed to have had CWD since 2018 in Mississippi. There are still 16 suspect positives in Mississippi awaiting confirmation.

Mississippi continues CWD testing

As of February 8, 2022, Mississippi hunters have submitted 5,893 samples for Chronic Wasting Disease this season. With Southeast Mississippi’s deer season still open, samples will continue to come in along with any road-killed deer. 

Adams County hunters have submitted 35 samples, Wilkinson County submitted 62 samples, Jefferson County submitted 65 samples, Franklin County submitted 42 samples and Claiborne County submitted 92 samples. 

What is CWD?

Chronic Wasting Disease is a disease in White-Tailed Deer, Elk, and Mule Deer. CWD is caused by a contagious prion. For some deer, it could take a year or more to develop symptoms. Those symptoms are drastic weight loss (wasting), stumbling, listlessness, and other neurologic symptoms. Infected animals shed prions through saliva, feces, blood, and urine.

Other deer can become infected through direct contact with an infected animal and indirect contact from an infected environment. Once the disease occurs in an area, evidence demonstrates eradication is unlikely.

At this time there is no evidence that suggests CWD poses any risk to humans. However, hunters are advised to not consume any meat from a CWD positive deer.