Sukie wrote:
>Okay, the BBC and Vanguard have pretty much identical things both with
>the error of an inserted "and" to make it "ferret and badger" instead
>of "ferret badger" as being found with SARS: taking one animal type and
>changing it to 2.  Perhaps CNN picked up on one of those and didn't
>realize the error which was present.
 
Nope.  If you look on the web site for the journal Nature, you'll find
the report of the actual study.  Here's the link (since it's a long link,
you'll have to copy and paste - if it doesn't work for you, try going to
the Nature home page at http://www.nature.com/):
 
http://www.nature.com/cgi-taf/DynaPage.taf?file=/nature/journal/v425/
n6961/abs/425915a_fs.html&dynoptions=doi1067527652
 
The report (well, all I saw was the abstract) refers to ferrets
specifically as Mustela furo.  I think the important thing is that,
while ferrets and cats may be able to get SARS, I'd bet dollars to donuts
that ferrets don't *spontaneously* get SARS -- meaning that house-bound
animals are not going to pick it up.  The troubling part to me is that
ferrets are not referred to as domesticated animals in the study (yup,
they call 'em wild).  The abstract does state: "The observation that
these two distantly related carnivores can so easily be infected with
the virus indicates that the reservoir for this pathogen may involve a
range of animal species."
 
--Mary & the Fuzzies
 
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Mary R. Shefferman, Editor, Modern Ferret Magazine
Trixie, Koosh, & Gabby, The Modern Ferrets
Read my blog! http://www.modernferretblog.com/mary
See my cool stuff! http://www.topicaltees.com
[Posted in FML issue 4317]