Another CWD case found north of Spokane

Another case of an always-fatal deer disease has been found in Eastern Washington.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife announced Monday that it had confirmed a case of chronic wasting disease in a white-tailed buck killed in game management unit 124, the same unit where the disease was first found last year.

It’s the only positive hit WDFW has reported so far this year. The Spokane Tribe reported earlier this month that a deer killed on the Spokane Reservation had tested positive for the disease.

That makes for a total of seven deer over the past two years that have tested positive for the CWD.

Since mandatory testing for hunter-killed and salvaged animals was ordered across all of Eastern Washington, biologists are processing more samples than ever before.

More than 3,400 samples have been gathered since July, according to WDFW. About 3,200 of those came from hunter-killed animals.

Some samples end up being untestable. The number of samples that have actually been tested is around 2,200.

CWD attacks the nervous systems of deer, elk and moose. It is not known to infect humans, but health officials advise against eating meat from infected animals.

Animals have tested positive for the disease in 35 states and five Canadian provinces. Biologists worry that the disease could decimate wildlife populations if left unmanaged.

The disease is caused by malformed proteins, called prions, in an animal’s body. Those prions – naturally occurring proteins in an animal’s body – are shed through bodily fluids and can infect otherwise healthy animals with the disease through direct contact.

For that reason, many states – including Washington and Idaho – restrict hunters from moving moose, deer or elk carcasses across state lines or out of areas where CWD is known to exist. There are also restrictions on importing whole carcasses or parts like the spine or brain tissue of animals killed in other CWD positive states.

In Idaho, compliance with those rules has been spotty at best, according to the Idaho Department of Fish and Game.

The agency ran a check station on Fourth of July Pass east of Coeur d’Alene in mid-November and found “compliance with CWD-related transport rules was very low,” according to a news release.

Idaho first found CWD in deer near White Bird in 2021. It has since been found in a few other areas, including near Bonners Ferry last year.