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USDA Wildlife Scientists Confirm COVID-19 in White-Tail Deer

Courtesy
/
Kyle Kellams
A herd to white-tail deer graze in a yard on Mt. Sequoyah in Fayetteville, where urban wild deer are abundant.

USDA scientists have detected SARS-CoV-2 — the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 — in white-tail deer in a half dozen states. New publishedresearch indicates deer are biologically vulnerable to the virus, which apparently is spreading deer-to-deer. This summer, Congress provided USDA Animal Plant and Health Inspection Service (APHIS) $300 million through the American Rescue Plan Act to expand monitoring and surveillance of susceptible animals for SARS-CoV-2, to measure the incidence as well as implications. 

Jacqueline Froelich is an investigative reporter and news producer for Ozarks at Large.
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