The bipartisan CWD Research and Management Act is set to invest $70 million annually in research and management techniques to slow the spread of the deadly disease affecting cervids like deer, elk and moose. 

That funding includes $35 million annually for research to focus on methods to detect CWD in live deer, harvested deer and the surrounding environment; best practices for reducing CWD through sustainable harvest; and factors contributing to local spread. Another $35 million would go toward management, including surveillance and testing. Priorities would include areas with high CWD prevalence, areas responding to new outbreaks, areas free of CWD but with greatest risk of CWD emerging, jurisdictions with the greatest financial commitment to combating CWD and efforts to develop comprehensive policies and programs to manage CWD. The bill also allows federal, state and tribal agencies to create and distribute educational materials to inform the public about CWD. 

CWD is a transmissible, always fatal, neurological disease that affects deer and other cervids such as elk, moose and reindeer/caribou. There is no test available for live deer — the only way to confirm infection is through lab testing of brain tissue or lymph nodes. 

The disease was detected in North Carolina for the first time last year, with five deer testing positive in Yadkin and Surry counties. North Carolina began testing in 1999 and increased its efforts after the disease was recorded east of the Mississippi River in 2002. The state has been using an annual surveillance strategy since 2018.