CWD Management in Illinois: Improving Turnaround Time

In an effort to protect the health of the Illinois white-tailed deer herd from chronic wasting disease (CWD), the Illinois Department of Natural Resources (IDNR) is constantly evaluating and improving the CWD surveillance and the adaptive management program to decrease the spread and impact of CWD. In Illinois, CWD surveillance uses three sources of data, hunter harvest, suspect deer, and special permit CWD surveillance, to help identify occurrence and introduction of CWD to new areas1. Furthermore, CWD surveillance informs the adaptive management to focus localized efforts and remove CWD-infected animals via sharpshooting—within a 2-section buffer zone around a known CWD-positive section (1 section = ~1 mile2).1 For almost 20 years, IDNR used Immunohistochemistry (IHC) as the diagnostic test for CWD. However, since July 1st, 2020, IDNR began using both IHC and ELISA (with a confirmatory IHC test) in their CWD diagnostic tools. The main goal was to improve the turnaround time of diagnostic results for hunters, meat processors, and State wildlife managers.