Rabid Rescue Dog

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130 – August, 2021

By Amy Fernandez

“I told you so” is pretty well-established as a useless approach to any productive debate. And honestly, in most of those situations, the dreadfully predictable outcome is nothing to gloat about. Specifically, I’m referring to the recent CDC announcement about their upcoming yearlong ban on foreign dog imports. Needless to say, that sort of drastic action marks a last ditch attempt to cope with an ongoing, spiraling mess. But just in case anyone needed a little more convincing, here’s an auspiciously timed news item that was reported by the AP on June 23.

According to the story, “a rabid dog imported into the US this month has sparked a public heath investigation in Chester County and across several states.” So far, specific details about the dog or its new owners were not forthcoming. But we do know that it arrived from the Republic of Azerbaijan. As tends to be the case in these deals, it was part of a large shipment of 33 dogs and one cat flown into O’Hare on June 10. By the time it arrived in its new home, it had been through the typical rescue dog pipeline; it had exposed at least another dozen people along the way. Thankfully, these dogs were shipped in a cargo bay. If it had been in the passenger cabin…well, COVID would be the least of the worries for those passengers.

The thing with rabies is that it can be very hard to spot. The symptoms and onset of the disease can vary from days to months. This particular case wasn’t diagnosed until the dog’s increasingly bizarre behavior drew enough scrutiny to arouse suspicion. In the meantime, health officials are working to track the rest of the animals from that shipment, which are generally scattered all over the country via these rescue groups. So, this is definitely a big mess. A single confirmed case not only has the potential to transmit canine rabies to a raft of other animals, there’s a real chance that anyone who had contact with the dog could have been infected. And believe me, rabies is something to take seriously.

Click here to read the complete article
130 – August, 2021

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Posted by AnthonyA on Aug 13 2021. Filed under Current Articles, Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.