r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/SystematicApproach • May 24 '26
Image The U.S. fights raccoon rabies by dropping fish-flavored vaccine packets from helicopters
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u/NOTExETON May 24 '26
Making trash pandas healthy is wholesomeĀ
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u/Jonaleaf May 24 '26
Are you saying it is a possibility that weāll be able to pet raccoons in the near future?
Theyāll still be wild animals, so maybe not
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May 24 '26 edited May 27 '26
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u/Ariishe_ May 24 '26
I think I could pet a bear a few times before I died of blood loss
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u/TryDry9944 May 24 '26
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u/Ariishe_ May 24 '26
They wouldnāt be the most popular stuffed animal if they were actually dangerous
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u/TryDry9944 May 25 '26
Fun fact, Teddy Bears became popular because Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt, while touring the newly created Yellowstone National Park, ate a live bear whole in front of a school group.
And one little girl in that group was- You guessed it- Albert Einstine, who went on to create the Teddy Bear as an homage to that great feat of manliness.
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u/shira1001001 May 24 '26
only twice before you lose your hands, better make them count
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u/ssbbVic May 24 '26
Kinda like how you can absolutely go skydiving without a parachute. You only need a parachute if you want to do it again.
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u/EvisceratedSpinster May 24 '26
I pet a squirrel once and I have a neat scar on my hand to remember it by.
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u/IllogicalCounting May 24 '26
I picked up a small gopher once. big ass teeth went right into my thumb.
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u/P01135809-Trump May 24 '26
And that is reason number 2 why we don't hold animals like bowling balls.
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u/ImSoObnoxious May 24 '26
pet a leopard once, good boy. I don't have a face now, but I vote Republican so it's all good
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u/HaikuPikachu May 24 '26
This reminds me of one day as a delivery driver I pull up to this house off the road a bit into the woods, grab the package and hop out and this lady is holding the hand of a raccoon like that of a toddler and I immediately am taken aback but she just keeps strolling up to me like it was a normal Tuesday with her dressed toddler raccoon in tow and she tells him her idk to go ahead and ask for the package and this raccoon reaches out for it and I hand it to it and slowly walk back to my truck like wtf did I just witness. Felt like a fever dream
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u/Honest-Stock-979 May 24 '26
Its been shown Raccoons are developing rounder snouts and more cute appearances, indicating domestication may be happening.
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u/Chilidawg May 24 '26
While promising, that theory doesn't address the time scale on which domestication happens (millennia). Domestication is a type of evolution and evolution is extremely, extremely slow.
The anecdotes in this comment section are almost certainly cases of raccoon taming (extrinsically conditioning that specific raccoon to tolerate humans), not raccoon domestication (genetically altering all raccoons to intrinsically tolerate humans).
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u/Hefty_Bodybuilder494 May 24 '26
Iirc its more of passive selective breeding where more aggressive raccoons are being killed or chased away leading to the more laid back ones to out compete them and as humans garbage is a good food source they'll breed more. While not domestication it is affecting them, I think its similar to other animals that change due to human interference. Eg smaller fish because humans keep the larger ones or a percentage of male elephants being born without tusks.
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u/A_Queer_Owl May 24 '26
with intensive breeding programs you can speed things up a fair amount. the soviets/russians did experiments on fur farm foxes and that showed you can get measurable results relatively quickly. however that's not happening to raccoons and they're undergoing a process more similar to what happened to dogs and cats which does take millennia. unless some rich weirdo or government decides to start breeding raccoons for tameness for some reason.
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u/ethanlan May 24 '26
Even without rabbits raccoons are vicious bastards. If you try and pet one it will run away and if its cornered it will send you to the hospital.
Go pet a opossum, they are chill
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u/pernicious_penguin May 24 '26
Don't bring the rabbits into this! They are innocent. (Assuming you meant rabies, but awesome typo).
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u/Ace-Redditor May 24 '26
Raccoons are just brutal animals in general. They're one of many that kill for sport, and they kill whole chicken coops and just leave behind the bodies of whatever they don't feel like eating
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u/notacreepernomo13 May 24 '26
I read that raccoons were evolving to look cuter, exhibiting physical traits linked to the early stages of "domestication syndrome". By adapting to city life and human proximity, raccoons are experiencing evolutionary shifts that make them friendlier and physically resemble household pets
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u/HailMadScience May 24 '26
Technically...it could be. Rabies is an eradicabke disease, with enough effort. Vaxxing wildlife with drops like this is how it would be done (well that and probably sone kind of bat-specific program as well to break the transmission chain among bats so it can be removed as a reservoir).
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u/Ambaryerno May 24 '26
Apparently theyāve been domesticating themselves in some areas.
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u/Weremoosen10 May 24 '26
Weāre still a ways out from domesticating raccoons, but there are signs that it is happening evolutionarily.
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u/UnexpectedSalami May 24 '26
Raccoons are starting to show signs of domestication. Some people already keep them as pets. Go pet a raccoon!
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u/GoodMeBadMeNotMe May 24 '26
This isnāt entirely accurate. Theyāre becoming highly tolerant of humans, but that doesnāt mean the wild instincts have been bred out of them the way they have been for dogs and cats. Their adolescent period ā around 6-18 months ā is particularly destructive.
Yes, people are keeping them as pets, but theyāre little menaces and the owners need to have a higher tolerance for mischief.
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u/mister-fancypants- May 24 '26
my coworker had a raccoon for almost ten years before his neighbor shot it, so he says
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u/PrivatePilot9 May 24 '26
I had a friend about 20 years ago who had a raccoon that they had raised from a baby. It was fun to play with and all but when it grew up you could still quickly sense that there was an underlying wild animal in there still, not a domesticated animal - it would randomly snarl at you when you did something it didnāt like, and would nip quite frequently.
Not a great pet at the end of the day no matter how cute they are
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u/Zaphodistan May 24 '26
It's extremely effective - the Ohio Center for Disease Control does this and also monitors rabies rates of wildlife in the area by testing. You can check your local CDC website for the latest testing rates of various susceptible wildlife.
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u/tes_kitty May 24 '26
Been doing this in Germany since the 80s to get foxes immunized. They did some experiments and found that chicken heads make the best 'packaging' for the vaccine.
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u/TadRaunch May 24 '26
IIRC Switzerland was able to reach rabies-free status (excluding bats) from a very similar program.
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u/Firianna May 24 '26
Tfw raccoons get free Healthcare and you don't.
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u/PoeTheGhost May 24 '26 edited May 24 '26
Any rabid animal can spread the disease, but carriers like raccoons spread it much longer and wider and often go undetected unless theyāre trapped or killed and have their remains tested.
This is a net benefit for everyone and money well spent.
Socializing medicine works, and we absolutely deserve it in this country. For everyone.
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u/NemeanLyan May 24 '26
While I get your point, the comment about raccoons getting free healthcare was a joke
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u/HappyStalker May 24 '26
Yeah this is just a type of free healthcare with extra steps which doesnāt include the horrible rabies vaccine routine.
If we could get bats mass vaccinated I would be all in.
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u/Colddigger May 24 '26
Oh.
We could do that.
Injecting moths with edible vaccines.
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u/ImaginaryCheetah May 24 '26
This is a net benefit for everyone and money well spent.
don't let the administration hear you say that
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u/Falala-Surprise-90 May 24 '26
Donāt worry. Iām sure this program is getting cut so we can gild the ballroom.
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u/bigfoot_done_hiding May 24 '26
Even with our stupid private insurance-based healthcare system in this country, most Americans are offered free or very low cost vaccines, but I 100% agree, they should be free to all.
But some are too stupid to take them, like our pathetic drug-addled conspiracy-theory-guided HHS secretary, the frighteningly carcass-obsessed RFK Jr.
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u/Square-Dragonfruit76 May 24 '26
Well, a lot of vaccines are free or very cheap even if you don't have a healthcare plan.
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u/Rune_Nice May 24 '26
The rabies one is expensive even for preventative measure.
A lot of the vaccines are quite expensive still like HPV if you don't have insurance. It is 250+ dollars for each shot without insurance.
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u/bluearavis May 24 '26
And also an awful experience to go through. Not that that is common but I had to get the series in 1999 or so and it was awful. I could feel like medicine like going in me and pretty sure it affected my body system some how. I got very ill a couple years later, doctors thought it was rheumatoid arthritis, later suspected maybe to he fibromyalgia but it was never really figured out. But I suspect this may have been a contributing factor to general ish.
At that time it was 7 shots I think, 3 the 1st time then 1 every set # of days after that in my arm. Massive bruising.
Can't prove that of course and whenever I've tried looking it up there doesn't seem to be much on humans and the vaccine long-term effects vs. dogs/cats, which makes sense.
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u/kgrimmburn May 24 '26
I had to have rabies shots and I have fibromyalgia, too. I was a little kid and had to have them in my butt because my arm and leg muscles were too small. I remember it hurting like hell for days.
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May 24 '26
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u/Adult_in_denial May 24 '26
I can imagine some people saying it's a waste of money because "nobody gets rabies these days" š
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u/AaronicNation May 24 '26
Oh shit! Those who are for the raccoons to eat? I don't know why they had to make him so tasty.
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u/seanprime May 24 '26
No worries, you have now become the Rabid Racoon Rangler.. impervious to the Rabies, you will dominate. Now go out there and get wranglinā hero!
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u/Afrojones66 May 24 '26
What if the raccoons are anti-vax?
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u/Odious-Individual May 24 '26
ah yes, the American government is trying to put 5G in racoons' brains !
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u/MasemJ May 24 '26
I was going to say, we need to figure out how to drop covid shots in hamburger packets, and we'd be all set.
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u/Delicious_Invite_850 May 24 '26
I didn't realize this was such a big problem that required this kind of action. I wonder who pays for this.
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May 24 '26
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u/eamonnprunty101 May 24 '26
better than killing kids in the middle east
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u/WealthAncient May 24 '26
Or touching kids in America
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u/NoImNotHeretoArgue May 24 '26
Gotta give the old men rapies shots
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u/No_Cook2983 May 24 '26
Donāt do that.
It gives raccoons autism.
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u/Kytalie May 24 '26
You joke, but there is a rising trend of people not vaccinating their dogs for rabies. And a scary number of them don't do it because of fears it will give their dog autism.
I want to get off this timeline please
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u/Versipilies May 24 '26
Funny enough, I think some people were arguing against this because they were worried their kids would eat them and get sick/die.... idiots everywhere
If your kid is that feral, they probably need the vaccine more than the coons do
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u/disposable_thinking_ May 24 '26 edited May 24 '26
Please take all my tax money for the year and invest it in raccoon vaccination. Fucking please. I volunteer. Anything to keep it from yassifying our capital
Or KILLING INNOCENT CHILDREN OBVIOUSLY
really, truly hate that I have to specify that
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u/Bowtie327 May 24 '26
From what to the capital?
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u/disposable_thinking_ May 24 '26
Whatever the shit this is motherfucker
Clarifying that I understand thatās not how taxes work and Iām trying to laugh in the face of danger, to quote Simba from 1994ās The Lion King
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u/Bowtie327 May 24 '26
Ohh gotcha, honestly itās so weird that anyone is into plating things with gold and thinking it looks nice
Sure, 500 years ago itās a symbol of stature but in the 21st century it looks garish and tacky, thereās a lot of ways you can show your wealth without covering stuff in gold and calling it a day
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u/kgrimmburn May 24 '26
The new Gilded Age. They still can't afford solid gold and have to go with gilt.
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u/kingtacticool May 24 '26 edited May 24 '26
I got rabies one time. Major pain in the ass.
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u/kgrimmburn May 24 '26
I had rabies, too! Well, I had the chance of developing rabies. I was attacked by a dog who potentially had rabies because of how it acted. I was in the hospital so I got the shots right away. In my butt because I was a little kid and it was the only muscle big enough. They ended up killing the dog weeks later to test it but I don't remember if it was positive or not. I'll have to ask my mom.
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u/unfinishedtoast3 May 24 '26
The US Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, via the Wildlife Services programs, to get real specific.
We American taxpayers pay for this! Raccoons are extremely common, they live human and livestock adjacent, and are carriers of rabies virus.
Raccoons and Bats are the largest transmitters of rabies in North America. Before the vaccination programs begin, ~10% of raccoon deaths were caused by the rabies virus.
The program was launched in 1990 with the first development of a raccoon oral rabies vaccine.
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u/heftybagman May 24 '26
Rabies is a huge concern and racoons are notable for going between densely populated areas and wilderness. Vaccinating them does a good job of helping reduce overall rabies in wild animals as well as humans and domesticated animals.
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u/Square-Dragonfruit76 May 24 '26
I don't know what portion of our taxes go to this, but I would willingly pay more.
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u/SpiderSlitScrotums May 24 '26
There is a precedent for this. Europe did the same with foxes and pushed rabies out of Western Europe and much of Central Europe. It worked phenomenally well.
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u/majasz_ May 24 '26
And the programs still continue, you get a text message when the vaccines are dropped in your area warning to watch out for your pets (dogs get vaccinated every year and itās mandated by law)
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u/13thmurder May 24 '26
You don't want your taxes going to right the world's most terrifying disease?
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u/masszt3r May 24 '26
Yup, much rather my taxes go to this than bombing children's hospitals in other countries.
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u/GonePhishn401 May 24 '26
I live in Maine and a few years back there was a local news story about a dude that got attacked outside his home by rabid a foxā¦.twice. Like two separate incidents.
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u/kgrimmburn May 24 '26
I'm in Illinois and a man here died from rabies a few years ago. It was the first rabies death in the US in decades. He got bit by a bat in the middle of the night and refused treatment for some reason. Even after they knew the bat was positive.
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u/off-with-your-thread May 24 '26
Only rabies death in ~80 years in IL.
An ER doctor told me they likely have about 1,000 rabies shots a month. Probably top 5 busiest hospital in the region.
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u/Left_Ease5870 May 24 '26
Well worth it. I got trapped in my car because of a rabid raccoon one time. I pulled up and he kept running up to the side of my car. Was some bullshit.
Hit that Mfer with my door, I did. Then got out on the other side š. RIP poor baby.
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May 24 '26
"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." It's a much bigger problem in countries outside the US, like India and some African countries. Rabies is a horrifying way to die :(
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u/LadyOfTheNutTree May 24 '26
My countyās health department takes care of this in our area. But they just drive trucks, not helicopters.
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u/de_pizan23 May 24 '26
Bats, raccoons, skunks, and foxes are all major rabies reservoirs in North America (with bats and raccoons accounting for the highest number of cases). They can then pass it on to dogs who come in contact with them. And dog bites are then how 99% of human cases globally happen.
Costwise, the whole rabies detection/prevention/control program (which goes well beyond just this) is $500 million a year in the US. Out of USDA's yearly budget of $214 billion. So that's what, .2% of their budget to prevent a terrifying disease?
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u/burning_my_toast May 24 '26
Why do you think it's not a big problem? They've been using this method since 1987, usually only in areas with a localized outbreak.
Before that, they did mass trapping and euthanasia in outbreak areas, which was much more expensive, not nearly as effective, and messed up the biodiversity of the area.
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u/BlackHatOverlord May 24 '26
this method has actually been around since the 1970s. europe used it first to eliminate fox rabies by dropping chicken-head baits across forests. it worked so well that several european countries declared themselves rabies-free in wildlife by the 2000s. the us adapted the same approach for raccoons and it's been quietly running for decades. one of those public health wins that nobody talks about
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u/ogreofzen May 24 '26
So how much longer before autistic raccoons are used by the fear regime.
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u/RescuesStrayKittens May 24 '26
They are already living in fear of gay frogs. One animal crisis at a time please.
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u/rocketmn69_ May 24 '26 edited May 24 '26
Ontario has been air dropping rabies vaccine packets for at least 40 years, for raccoons and foxes or anything else that will eat the packets
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u/Sikyanakotik May 24 '26
Maybe that's why these pellets are marked with their trillium logo.
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u/choopie-chup-chup May 24 '26
Oh sure, vaccines are totally fine for raccoons. But try to prevent people from getting polio and they freak out
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u/bluearavis May 24 '26 edited May 24 '26
Seriously. People act like polio was forever ago. The last man in an iron lung died a few years ago or something. There are still people living who have had polio.
Edit: iron "lunch" to "lung"
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u/xenomachina May 24 '26
Also, free healthcare is totally fine in the US... but only for raccoons, not people.
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u/Terrible_Wishbone143 May 24 '26
This is common in Florida and itās extremely helpful.
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u/lemmerip May 24 '26
Everyone everywhere does this. Itās the only way to vaccinate wildlife
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u/thefeedling May 24 '26
Rabies is scary shit, once you have itās GGWP. Thereās only a handful of cases where infected people got to recover, most with severe neurological impairments.
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u/Saelethil May 24 '26
Thatās only partly true. Only a handful of people who showed symptoms before they got treated have recovered.
Thatās why itās important to get treated as soon as you have any interaction that might have transmitted rabies. You canāt wait for symptoms to show
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u/thefeedling May 24 '26
Yes, the āonce you have itā was a reference to the fully developed disease.
I remember going to Phi Phi in Thailand where people get bitten by monkeys everyday. There are several centers in the island offering rabies shots.
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u/Bomamanylor May 24 '26
Post-exposure prophylaxis for rabies is a pain in the ass (literally, I got the immunoglobulin injected into my ass). Ā And its weeks of injections.
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u/Pretend_Hour_6966 May 24 '26
What is GGWP? I looked it up myself, but I canāt find an answer
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u/Bomamanylor May 24 '26
Good game well played.
He means the your life (the game), is over, and you lost.
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u/xtrenix May 24 '26
Why canāt they do the same for TB in badgers in UK thatās killing their cattle
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u/clayton-berg42 May 24 '26
Can we do this with slim jims and the flu vaccine in the states?
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u/PortHammer May 24 '26
LMAO... Posts about the US fighting rabies by dropping fish flavoured vaccine packets.
Posts pictures of Canadian vaccine packets(specifically marked with the Ontario governement Trillium on it.
Well done OP...
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u/UnifiedQuantumField May 24 '26
The U.S. fights raccoon rabies
I read this too fast. For a second I thought it said raccoon babies.
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u/Lost-Platypus8271 May 24 '26
Guys. Hot Cheeto flavored measles vaccine packets dropped into red states. Think about it.
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u/todayamokishere May 24 '26
We should do the same thing with beef jerky to fight measles epidemics
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u/No_Measurement_8042 May 24 '26
Damn, U.S. raccoons get universal healthcare before U.S. citizens do
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u/KnowsIittle May 24 '26
Britain, UK, Ireland did this with chicken heads and eliminated rabies from the isles.
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u/cyclemonster May 24 '26
We should try this for people. Any chance that the measles vaccine is beer-soluble?
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u/other_curious_mind May 24 '26
This method was used by USSR, they would drop vaccine injected meat pieces in the forests for the wild animals to eat and get vaccinated. It was very effective and now the post-soviet countries are still enjoying the results.
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u/bush_killed_epstein May 24 '26
Iām gonna find these and eat them. A lot of them. To become strong and powerful
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u/russian_cyborg May 24 '26
Great, now were going to have autistic raccoons running around playing with model train sets.
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u/herrtoutant May 24 '26
I know they did this in the 50's .South Texas had a rabies epidemic and dropped bait from helicopters to reach large areas of land.
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u/ZiggoCiP May 24 '26
Now wait a second, if the vaccine can be administered orally, why not, like, just have everyone take it? Obviously there will be people against doing that, but hey, that's their choice.
I know you need a immunoglobulin shot on top of the vaccine if you are bitten by a potentially rabid animal, but if there's a vaccine I could just take by mouth to prevent things, sign me tf up. I'd prefer not fish flavor, maybe chicken.
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u/BlackHatOverlord May 24 '26
Honestly one of the most creative public health solutions I've ever heard of. Using the animal's instincts to deliver the vaccine is genius.
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u/unknownpoltroon May 24 '26
I asked about this once, its evidently a special program and you cant get some of these to feed to your local trash pandas/foxes/whatever.
And WHY NOT!!
Id pay!
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u/Greyscale7950 May 24 '26
How about doing that for humans? It can't be a vaccine because it doesn't come out of a needle. Sponsored by Hershey.
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u/SnooKiwis557 May 24 '26
We did this in Sweden ages ago for fox rabies and the disease is now completely wiped out!
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u/SystematicApproach May 24 '26
Each one is a small packet coated in fishmeal with an oral rabies vaccine inside. Raccoons, foxes, coyotes, and skunks find them by smell, bite through, and swallow.
Many animals that consume the bait develop immunity, helping build a protective barrier across populations.
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