TORONTO — Dr Kieran Moore, Chief Medical Officer of Health, issued the following statement:
“Brant County Health Unit has received laboratory confirmation of a human case of rabies in a resident of Brantford-Brant. The illness is suspected to have been acquired from direct contact with a bat in Ontario. To ensure privacy for the family, no further information about the individual will be released.
“As a precaution, family members, health care providers and other close contacts are being assessed and offered post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP), as needed. Rabies is a viral infection that causes brain and spinal cord inflammation. It is typically spread to humans through direct contact with saliva of an infected animal, such as through a bite or scratch. In Canada, rabies infections are commonly found in bats, but skunk, fox, and raccoon rabies variants are also circulating in Ontario.
“If anyone in Ontario has direct physical contact with a bat, even if there is no visible bite or scratch, or if they have been bitten or exposed to saliva or infectious tissues from another animal species, they should seek immediate medical attention. The health care provider, in consultation with the local public health unit, will assess the risk of rabies and may offer vaccines to prevent infection.
“Immediate medical care following suspected rabies exposures is critical. Post-exposure medical care includes washing the area with soap and water as soon as possible, a dose of rabies immune globulin and a series of rabies vaccines which must be administered as soon as possible after exposure. This treatment is nearly 100 per cent effective when administered promptly.
“Cases of human rabies are extremely rare due to effective public health prevention and control measures. This is the first domestically acquired case of human rabies in Ontario since 1967. In Canada, there have been only 26 other known cases of rabies in humans since reporting began in 1924.”