WI legislators just weakened rules aimed at stemming spread of CWD

When it comes to the outdoors - - be it water or wetlands or wildlife - - Wisconsin under GOP control refuses to get it right.

And now, more evidence:

With chronic deer wasting disease, (CWD), now affecting 55 of our 72 counties, the geniuses in a key legislative committee decided the best way to deal with the problem as the 2018 gun deer season approached was to block some new rules worked out among major stakeholders to stem CWD statewide.

The Legislature's rules committee voted to suspend a new restriction that would have prevented hunters from moving deer out of CWD-affected areas of the state. The committee voted 6 to 4 to block that portion of an emergency rule that was designed to slow the spread of chronic wasting disease.

A motion to suspend restrictions that require added fencing of deer farms failed 4 to 6. 

The stakeholders even included Walker, but powerful deer farming interests out-flanked Walker despite his offer of state subsidies to defray some of the cost of fencing the rules would have required.

The DNR noted the move in a news release Oct. 3rd.

It's amazing that Wisconsin will not deal effectively with CWD, despite ample publicity, like this data released in April:

For the record, the agency [DNR] documented a record 599 CWD cases during the 2017-18 surveillance year, which runs April through March. 

The DNR tested more deer last year (9,879) than in 2016-17, a 62 percent increase from 6,095, but still documented a 6 percent infection rate. 

The infection rate for 447 positives in 2016-17 was 7.3 percent.

When the DNR tested 9,305 deer in 2007, the infection rate was 1.9 percent (135 cases) among 7,192 deer analyzed in the southern farmlands zone.  

That area’s infection rate in 2017 was 10.6 percent (588 cases) for 5,545 deer tested.