Kym wrote:
>I was told by a Dr. Rose that 1 in 10 have reactions and "no vet in NJ
>will give a ferret both Imrab and FerVac in the same visit.
 and
>My guys have had these shots before and I know they don't get reactions
>from either shot and they have had them in the past together, even if I
>signed a disclaimer, he would not do this.
 
Qh, that clarifies a lot; not giving the two together is very different
from not giving at all as L. had said.  Easy to see how that wording could
lead to a misunderstanding, esp. if the process is at all new to someone.
 
The vet showed good sense not giving them together.  Past lack of reactions
means zip.  Allergic reactions REQUIRE past exposure; the body has to have
had a chance to mistake a safe thing for an invader and sort of "add that
to its memo pile" of things to get defensively excited about.  Without an
exposure it can't do that, so past exposures without reactions don't mean
anything about future chance of doing so.  For some reason this aspect of
allergic reactions is not well understood in the general populace, but it's
just like among people.  Take food allergies for example; they tend to be
to foods eaten most commonly: personal favorite foods, or culturally or
regionally common ones such as rice in Southern Asia but wheat in North
America.  Some things have greater chances of becoming allergans but an
allergy can develop to just about anything, and for unknown reasons certain
things may wax or wane as allergans in a population (for example, potatoes
are becoming more common as one now in the U.S., ditto latex and therefore
bananas).  The general rules for allergies extend to allergic reactions to
vaccines including the extreme ones such as anaphylactic reactions.  It's
something I have to know about; each side of our family does it in multiple
members, and we currently have one ferret who does, and have had three in
the past.
 
Still have not run into that 1 in 10 before.
 
This leads to a question for those in midwest: there was a midwest club
that noticed that when the vets ordered directly from the maker they had
no reactions in hundreds of vaccinations, but when the vaccine came trough
a distributor they had a number of reactions.  Hypothesis was that storage
conditions at the distributor might affect it.  They were going to
follow-up on this with continued observations and numbers.  What became of
this?  Anyone else do a comparison?
 
Joannie, carbon monoxide detectors are set for levels that pose risks for
humans, ventilate the place well and contact your local health department
*** immediately *** for solutions.  It may be that the autopsies on your
ferrets may have saved your life and those of the others in your home.  Ah,
just read that the inspection is being done today.  Good.  This is just one
more reason to have those detectors, folks!  I am very, very sorry that you
had to lose two first, but am very glad that you didn't also die.
 
Like Bill G., I thought that the MF discussion went a bit better this time.
What people don't know is that behind the scenes people --even those with
very different views (as far as I know and as far as my interactions went)
certainly remained friends, some still exchanging info on non-ferret things
that are of mutual interest, sharing jokes, etc.  Yes, there are some
strong feelings on the topic, but accepting differences of opinions is all
part of being an adult and dealt with everyday.  It's no big deal.  Bet if
you asked others you'd learn the same from many of them.  Just reassuring
people that it is not a matter of fighting -- just expressions of opinions.
Seems to be some mistaken notion held by a few that there's fighting going
on.  'T'aint so, at least here.
[Posted in FML issue 3187]