Anne writes:
>In case someone has missed it, bird flu was confined in a Eurpeon stone
>marten.  Martens are in the same family as ferrets, Mustelidae.  And
>yes, I know the marten got it (probably) from eating an infected dead
>bird, but this is not good once ignorant people get involved.
 
Yep, just keep the animals indoors in areas that have it, please.
 
>And does anyone know what the dangers are of chicken in pet food?
 
It will probably be low because those farms will be shut down.  The last
thing they would want would be someone working with the contaminated
carcasses or being exposed to an animal which can get bird flu (cats,
ferrets, dogs -- dogs have not been seen with active infection but feral
and farm dogs have been found with antibodies to it so they can contract
it) if it modifies further.  I am waiting to hear if pigs can get this
version; no word, yet.
 
Keep your shoes away from your animals if you are in an area with this
influenza to be safest.  There is some work going on to see if guano
(bird dung fertilizer might spread it) so until it is known if it does
or does not just be careful.
 
My suspicion is that the larger concern for the pet food supply is which
food makers have been working on non-poultry foods for when the supply
stream alters and stored food is used up, also those who pet people who
stop using kibbled food need to learn about nutrition because a plain old
meat diet will cause malnutrition in ferrets, cats, or dogs.  It is not a
balanced diet.
 
What would be optimal for poultry would be to be in indoor settings,
without crowding, and with good health in general since being crowded,
stressed, or ill increases risk of catching any types of infection.  In
the U.S.  with so much major corporate farming we will not have anything
even close to that in time.  I have heard that there is work for such
farms on-going to try to develop an aerosol vaccination method but the
person doubted that it would realize success before that strain of avian
influenza hits here in the U.S., though, who knows, they may get lucky.
If we are fortunate enough to not get the disease till next year maybe
the logical thing would be as much production as possible this year and
then just planning on not having poultry at most farms next year, or just
a few, more for egg and population continuation than anything else.  It
may be less costly to not even take the risk of having typical "stock"
than to possibly lose all.  I don't know.  Those are just brain bubbles
floating around...
 
I would not be surprised if a number of pet food makers are scrambling
to make non-poultry foods.  If anyone is working on ferret ones for when
supply may become low or very costly, yet, though, I don't know.
 
Meanwhile, I have heard it postulated that this might revive the rabbit
meat industry in the U.S.  Will it?  I have no idea.
 
Remember that at this point there has *not* yet been a confirmed mutation
of the virus which allows for casual transmission among mammal.  The
infected mammals of each type, including us, are getting it by handling,
butchering, consuming infected wild birds and poultry.  This virus does
mutate pretty rapidly, though, and is very widely spread, so the chances
that this particular one could mutate to have casual mammal to mammal
transmission at some point is high.
 
In the 1918 influenza the number of people with human TB in the world
crashed and since then never came back to the levels before the
influenza.  There are papers from Japan, Spain, the U.S.  and elsewhere
discussing this.  No one knows if people with TB were simply more likely
to die of the influenza or if those with TB are more likely to contract
it (which has been suggested but not formally studied).  This led to my
asking some experts *if* avian TB -- which can be gotten from raw poultry
by ferrets, dogs, and cats -- and which according to some vet sites has
been seen to an uncomfortable amount in some farmed poultry, could
increase vulnerability of farms with those birds to avian influenza.  I
was told that the presence of avian TB would *NOT* increase the
vulnerability to avian influenza beyond what any serious non-pulmonary
disease would because avian TB is not primarily a pulmonary (lung)
disease.  Avian TB is normally hepatic (liver), splenic (spleen), and/or
intestinal.  Learn something every day...
 
There is work on-going, too, on which types of vaccine route might be
least likely to allow the start of a cytokine storm (the type of massive
immune system response which is the big danger with this infuenza), and
also into medical approaches to cytokine storms.
 
-- Sukie (not a vet)
Ferret Health List co-moderator
http://www.smartgroups.com/groups/ferrethealth
FHL Archives fan
http://ferrethealth.org/archive/
replacing
http://fhl.sonic-weasel.org
International Ferret Congress advisor
http://www.ferretcongress.org
[Posted in FML issue 5178]