Reminder: every one should read the health sections at:
http://www.ferretcentral.org , http://www.afip.org/ferrets/index.html ,
http://www.ferretdoctor.com , http://www.miamiferret.org/fhc ,
and other sites with information from vets or partly from vets to learn
about health problems.  Once again people are posting about standard
health difficulties which could be covered in better and more accurate
detail by checking these resources than by asking here, so reading these
sites would simply better serve the fuzzies.
 
Meeteetse is improving!  Don't know if it's the reduction in pred now
that she's on the diazoxide, or if the antibiotics are helping at all.
Yesterday she had only one incidence of incontinence; the first time there
has been an improvement and so far we have not encountered any today.
 
As far as choosing to not have human children due to a genetic quirk which
could be just as difficult or more difficult for the child, that's a
personal choice.  Steve and I both go into anaphylactic shock for certain
foods, and that tends to be a genetic tendency in humans.  We were advised
to not reproduce given how dangerous this could be for any offspring and
followed that advice; later found that I couldn't carry full term, anyway,
due to another problem, but the point is that it was our choice and we
made it the way we personally felt would be best given the possible
dangers involved.  It's a different situation for humans because we make
our OWN decisions, based upon our own knowledge of the risk factors and
whether we personally find a feature to be very difficult.  Not only do
ferrets not make those choices, but they do not know who will wind up
raising their young or if those little ones will find the patience and
love needed in life; that's a far sight different from loving parents
(whether deaf or hearing) helping a deaf child find his or her way in the
world.
 
Steve and I also both have crummy eyes, but I don't think that would have
stopped a choice to have children.  It can be worked around.  (Steve may
have lousy, crummy, defective eyes, but he's not a lousy, crummy,
defective person; make up your own minds about me... ;-) .)
 
While I also have problems with calling an INDIVIDUAL "defective" (but
not with calling the ears, or the eyes, or the immune system, or whatever
part "defective"), I do recognize that ferrets with sensory losses are
more likely to have problems in homes not prepared to deal with those
sensory losses, and that even in homes which are very used to ferrets
(such as our's) a very spirited one can be a harder training challenge
than one with hearing.
 
The discussion on deafness was (past tense) centering on a single KNOWN
and RECOGNIZABLE cause, not on deafness in general; in that way it
differed greatly from the human deafness posts.
[Posted in FML issue 3115]