Rabid raccoon reported in Swisshelm Park, 13th in Allegheny County this year

Another raccoon in Allegheny County has tested positive for rabies, county health officials said Wednesday.

The raccoon was spotted along Windermere Drive in Pittsburgh’s Swisshelm Park neighborhood, according to the release from health department director Dr. Karen Hacker.

It is the 13th rabid animal reported in the county so far this year and the 10th raccoon. Two bats and one cat have also tested positive.

There were 25 reported rabies cases in the county last year, though that number has yet to be finalized by the state Department of Health. The county saw 15 cases in 2017 and 23 in 2016, according to health officials.

The virus, transmitted by a bite or scratch from an infected animal, is almost always fatal if left untreated, health officials said.

Anyone bitten or scratched by a stray or wild animal is advised to clean the area and seek medical treatment, though the last reported human rabies case in Pennsylvania was in 1984, according to data from the state department of health.

Across the state in 2017, the most recent year for which data are available, 347 animals tested positive for rabies, and half of those were raccoons.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lists the last known case of rabies in a human as being in May 2017, when a 65-year-old woman in Virginia contracted the virus from a dog bite.