Because Smartgroups seems to have some problems losing things sent from the site I am sending this from our e-mail addy instead as a second try. (Yes, besides work moderators have problems, too, like anyone else, and yes, we have contacted Smartgroups about the difficulty. Mike made sure of that.) Thankfully, ECE is not contagious for an entire lifetime, though the damage done by it may result in later intestinal woes, and even kidney problems. When we had it here we did not go to a pet store, or a show, or even have visitors with ferrets for a full year to avoid spreading it. Some have intermittent intestinal woes afterward due to damage to the small intestine while some always suffer from such damage. When a ferret has an unexpressed health problem being knocked down by ECE can cause the other worry to emerge as well as happened with our 'Chopper the Organic Helicopter. The dehydration that occurs can create kidney damage and shorten a ferret's life that way. That happened to our Spot. Scooter here developed IBD which is known to be a problem that can happen as a result of ECE as well as possible other causes. In turn, in some (fortunately few, apparently) IBD can lead to lympho. One thing I am looking forward to seeing is how many other health difficulties reduce once the long, long, hard work toward eventually developing a vaccine is fruitful. Won't it be great if we also soon afterward see fewer ferrets with IBD, kidney disease, lympho...? It is such important but difficult work. [Posted in FML issue 3868]