Folks:
My wife and I have noted a lot of activity in the mail list about
supposed misinformation about ferrets attacking children and ferrets
having rabies. Everyone seems to be very confused as to where this
information is coming from. My wife (a practicing board certified
family practice physician) would like you all to know that the current
information about ferrets attacking children, ferrets with rabies,
etc. is all actually coming from the Centers for Disease Control (the
"CDC"). The state organizations (such as the departments of health)
are merely forwarding on this information. If the CDC says that there
was a confirmed case of ferrets with rabies, there *was*, no if, ands
or buts. My wife is a little more doubtful about the information about
ferrets attacking infants, which sounds a lot more like an urban
legend, but still might have happened.
Please note that what's different here seems to be the way in which the
information is being used: the CDC tracks all animal/human contacts
that have "problems" thus they would also have information on hand
about dogs and cats attacking children, dogs and cats with rabies,
etc. It seems that the information about ferrets with the same
problems are being taken a tad more urgently...
My wife, who adores our ferrets, feels that the people who attend the
ferret mail list are a self-selected population of ferret enthusiasts
and that people who have had problems with ferrets are unlikely to be
part of this mail list. So don't be surprise if no one on this list
can recall any negative incidents...
The particular case that everyone on this mail list should be aware of
is one in which a baby ferret was purchased from a pet store and had
already contacted rabies (prior to purchase) and was not old enough to
have had the rabies vaccination. This pet was taken to a school by
it's owner and thereby exposed an entire classroom to rabies. She
believes that the entire classroom had to take the rabies injection
series! The rabies was confirmed in this pet - not just rumored. The
point is that you need to know your dealer: that they take good care of
their pets and do not expose them to rabies.
As a practicing physician, the animal injuries that she has dealt with
include a severe scarring bite wounds to the face of a toddler who was
attacked by their grandmother's dog and several cat bites which rapidly
developed severe infections. Any close contact with another species,
particularly carnivores, can result in injures. Ferrets are not
unusual in this respect.
Thank you.
Doug and Birgit
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[I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the collective experience of the FML,
or what some members of the FML know about the subject. One particular
issue I would refer you to is 039 (send "GET FERRET 039" according
to the instructions in the header) which summarizes what is known
about ferret attacks according to two of the most influential
"anti-ferret" people. We *know* of such incidents. A death in Carson
City, one in England. Constantine and Dietch have documented
other non-fatal incidents.
We're perfectly willing to accept the reports issued by CDC. Such
things *have* happened. What we do not accept is how much they
are being blown out of proportion. How, as my vet put it (see
issue 070), some of even the most respected professionals verge
on the hysterical about ferrets. How even statistical errors
on the order of a factor of 10 *still* show that ferrets are
responsible, on a per-capita basis, for FAR fewer incidents than
dogs or cats.
Why does an animal that has been responsible for possibly as many
as 100 reported incidents of any kind over the last 10 years get
such bad press at the hands of various health units, when "man's best
friend" is responsible for approximately 44,000 incidents per *year*
involving severe injuries? [At the time article 039 was written,
there were estimated to be 46,000,000 dogs and 3,500,000 ferrets
in the US. A ratio of about 13:1. A lot smaller than the
<severe injuries from a dog>:<any reported incident of a ferret>
ratio of 4,400:1. Per-capita this is 350:1. Even if the numbers
are off by an order of magnitude, it's still 35:1.
Can you explain why health units are so quick to describe the dangers
of ferrets as if they were some sort of "devil creature"? It reminds
me of medaeval folklore, of swinging the bodies of dead cats in
the cemetary at midnight.
Can you explain why there's such an uproar about rabies in ferrets,
when exhaustive searches turn up perhaps 50 reported cases of rabies
in ferrets over the past decade, when in Ontario alone, there are
300-500 confirmed cases of rabies in dogs and cats per year, and
something like 1500-2000 people get the full rabies series?
Would you consider a cow to be a severe rabies risk? There are
a couple dozen cattle with confirmed cases of rabies per year in
Ontario alone. I don't think there's ever been a rabid ferret in
this province.
Why is it reported this way? Frankly I dunno. I wish I knew.]
[Posted in FML issue 0535]
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