Elimination of Arctic fox variant rabies from southern Ontario, Canada

The province of Ontario, Canada, experienced a major epizootic of rabies due to the Arctic fox virus variant (AFVV) beginning in northern Ontario in 1954. The disease quickly spread south in red fox (Vulpes vulpes) populations and by 1958 was firmly established across southern Ontario. Between 1958 and the start of wildlife rabies control efforts in 1989, Ontario reported 49,125 AFVV rabies cases, averaging 1535 per year. Comprehensive and collaborative research, followed by large-scale campaigns to immunize wildlife using baits containing a live-attenuated  oral rabies vaccine, led to the elimination of AFVV from southeastern and southcentral Ontario. A primary host shift from red fox to striped skunk (Mephitis mephitis) hampered efforts to eliminate the virus in southwestern Ontario.  This challenge was overcome by deployment of a novel adenovirus-glycoprotein recombinant oral vaccine that effectively immunized both species. After 30 years of persistent and adaptive research led by the province and involving academia, industry, and the federal government, and a wide variety of targeted rabies control campaigns, AFVV appears to have been eliminated from southern Ontario, with the last case confirmed in December 2018. The significant achievement of eliminating AFVV in southern Ontario demonstrates successful landscape level disease control but caution must be taken due to the risk to public health and potential for re-incursion from the endemic north. In this presentation we report on the history of AFVV in Ontario and methods used to eliminate the disease in southern parts of the province.