>Ferrets don't have dander like cats, dogs, and birds   True
>People can be allergic to ferrets                      False
>If you really love your ferret, you will find          ????
>something else to be allergic to
 
Sorry, Randy but you are wrong and an Allergy 101 course is in order.
 
A person can become allergic to just about anything which the body mistakes
for an invader.  It's not a choice situation, either in terms of what is
allergic to or in terms of how bad an allergy gets.
 
There has even been a case which made a medical journal of one individual
who is so allergic to ferrets that they threw him into such a bad reaction
that it and almost killed him despite emergency medical care followed by
hospitalization.
 
It may help to know what an allergy is.  In allergies a part of the immune
system which normally has functions including fighting parasites begins to
mistake other things for invaders, and in some cases it so badly mistakes
the nature of the particles that it wages a massive reaction which be
deadly within minutes.  Luckily, most allergic reactions are mild, but
allergies do kill tens of thousands every single year.  In reactions mast
cells produce too much histamine and that has its effects.  If the reaction
is mild there can be runny nose, mild coughing, some post-nasal drip,
either runny or dry eyes depending on the degree of inflammation, perhaps
some GI tract inflammation, or rash or hives.  The worst responses have
several modes including: asthma's inflammation and clogging in the lungs
which causes the person to smother, or the tongue swelling and choking a
person to death, or dermal necrosis causing mucus membrane necrosis and
sometimes death of outer skin, too, or anaphylaxia may occur complete
with bloody runs, drops in blood pressure which can cause fatal results,
swelling of mucus membranes that chokes or smothers a person to death, etc.
 
Allergies are a medical disorder and often a fatal one, not a choice for
the people who suffer from them, any more than some ferrets choose to have
allergic reactions to vaccinations.
 
Finally, of course, ferrets have dander; anything that sheds dead skin
cells does.  A few even have dandruff.
 
In past discussions of ferrets and allergies to them it has turned out
that multiple ferret people have had such allergies though they appear
less common in general than those to cats or dogs.  One exception: a
number of people are set off ONLY by whole males but not to other ferrets,
and interestingly it turned out that a number of those people were also
allergic to cats.
 
Yes, ferrets can transport things that cause allergies, as well, but they
can --- in and of themselves -- be a cause.
 
The idea that allergies are "invented" by their sufferers has been thrown
away as an old medical superstition for maybe as long as 40 to 50 years.
[Posted in FML issue 3362]