{"id":292997,"date":"2025-10-10T21:58:36","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T21:58:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/292997\/"},"modified":"2025-10-10T21:58:36","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T21:58:36","slug":"person-bitten-by-rabid-bat-in-southeast-michigan-health-officials-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/292997\/","title":{"rendered":"Person bitten by rabid bat in Southeast Michigan, health officials say"},"content":{"rendered":"

ST. CLAIR COUNTY, Mich. <\/strong> \u2013 A bat in Southeast Michigan has tested positive for rabies, and one person was bitten by it, health officials announced. <\/p>\n

State health officials notified the St. Clair County Health Department that a bat found within the county has tested positive for rabies, according to a release on Oct. 10. <\/p>\n

One person was bitten by the bat and referred for proper medical treatment. <\/p>\n

This is the first rabid bat detected in St. Clair County in 2025. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what to know about rabies and how to protect yourself against the virus:<\/p>\n

What is rabies, how to avoid exposure<\/p>\n

Health officials say about 60 animals throughout the state test positive for rabies each year, and about 90% of them are bats. <\/p>\n

Rabies is a virus that spreads through a scratch or bite from an infected animal. It\u2019s mostly found in bats, raccoons, skunks and foxes in the U.S., according to health officials. <\/p>\n

People should avoid having contact with bats and wild animals.<\/p>\n

Health officials say that any contact with a bat should be treated as a possible exposure, even if there isn\u2019t a scratch or bite that can be seen. <\/p>\n

What to do if you\u2019ve had contact with bat, other animal<\/p>\n

Anyone who has had contact with a bat or other wild animal should call the St. Clair County Health Department at 810-987-5300 (option 7).<\/p>\n

If safe to do so, people are advised to capture the bat<\/a> for testing and contact St. Clair County Animal Control at 810-984-3155.<\/p>\n

State law also requires all animal bites to be reported to the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services and animal control. <\/p>\n

How to protect your pets<\/p>\n

To protect your pets from contracting rabies, make sure they are up to date on their rabies vaccines and contact a veterinarian if you believe they have been bitten or scratched by a wild animal, according to health officials. <\/p>\n

For more information and to report an exposure, you can call the St. Clair County Health Department\u2019s Communicable Disease Program at 810-987-5300 (option 7) and St. Clair County Animal Control at 810-984-3155.<\/p>\n

You can also click here for more information<\/a> about preventing rabies from the CDC. <\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 by WDIV ClickOnDetroit – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ST. CLAIR COUNTY, Mich. \u2013 A bat in Southeast Michigan has tested positive for rabies, and one person…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":292998,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[210,150027,727,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-292997","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-southeast-michigan","10":"tag-st-clair-county","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115352115990009031","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=292997"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292997\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/292998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=292997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=292997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=292997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}