The following are quotes from the 7 page affidavit of William N. Hall, M.D., M.P.H. as submitted to the Court Of Appeals. para 1 - 6 are his personal credetials 7. The mission of the Department is to protect human health by preventing disease and injury. Because of this responsibilitty, state public health officials must take seriously any potential exposure to an essentially fatal disease such as rabies. 8. Rabies consultations by the Department with local health departments are always based on an assessment of risk 9. Public health officials are often in a difficult position of having to choose human health over the life of an animal. While these are not pleasant decisions, and no one likes having to make such a choice, because rabies is essentially fatal for people once symptoms develop, public health officials will always choose the safest option when making decisions on animal verses human life. 10. The facts and information cited below compel our department to recommend that the ferret in this case be immediately euthanized and tested for rabies. 11. In Michigan, there are two federal documents upon which we base our recommendations concerning rabies control and prevention. 12. The first document is titled, "Rabies Prevention - United States, 1991, Recommendations of the Immunization Practices Advisory Committee (ACIP)" published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, (MMWR) March 22, 1991. 13. The second document is the Compendium of Animal Rabies Control published by the National Association o State Public Health Veterinarians on an annual basis. This document is also published as a supplement in MMWR. 14. Michigan's Communicable Disease Rules, last updated in 1993, adopts by reference, the 1992 version of the Compendium of Animal Rabies Control. 15. Both of these documents are the products of advisory communities and represent the consensus view on rabies prevention by experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, academia, other government agencies and clinical practice. 16 Both of these documents serve as the basis for rabies guidelines in all species of animals, including dogs and cats. 17. The 1997 version of the compendium does not differ from the 1992 version with regard to ferrets and the provision of a post-bite quarrantine period (there is no established quarantine which would ensure a ferret is free from rabies). Thus the accepted standard has not changed from 1992. 18. Rabies is a viral disease that attacks the neurologic system. It is an ivariably fatal disease. Virus-laden saliva of a rabid animal is introduced by a bite or scratch. 19. the incubation period of rabies in humans is usually 3-8 weeks, although there have been rare instances of incubation periods greater than one year. The incubation period is defined as the time interval between initial contact with an infectious agent and the first appearance of symptoms associated with the infection. 20. Prophylactic vaccination is safe and effective in preventing rabies if given shortly after the bite-exposure occurs. The effectiveness of the preventive intervention declines as time passes since the exposure, but it is believed to be of potential value up until the time that symptoms of rabies begin. 21. Once clinical signs have begun in a person, the usual duration of illness is 2-6 days without medical intervention. Death is often due to respiratory paralysis. Diagnosis is made by specific tests of brain tissue. 22. There have been between 14 and 52 exposures of people, or pets to laboratory proven rabid animals each year in Michigan since 1990. Michigan did identify a laboratory confirmed rabid ferret in 1985 Ontonagon county that involved human exposure. Rabies positive bats and other animals are reported throughout the state every year, thus no area of Michigan is considered to be free of rabies. Michigan's last case of human rabies occurred in a six-year-old child in 1983. 23. Vaccination of any animal, even dogs and cats, with a USDA approved rabies vaccine is no guarantee that rabies will be prevented. that is why, if a dog or a cat bites a person, the animal is placed in 10 days of confinement and observation whether or not it is vaccinated. 24. We know from scientific studies and from many years of world wide experience, that the virus shedding period for a dog or cat is only a few days. 25 The "virus shedding period" for a particular species refers to the time period in which the virus is available at the exit portal, such as saliva. During this period, the animal is capable of transmitting the rabies virus by biting a person. 26. thus, when a dog or cat bites a person, it will be showing signs of rabies at that time or within a few days. If signs of disease occur in the dog or cat during confinement, there is time to administer the lifesaving post-exposure treatement to the person who has been bitten. 27. In contrast to dogs and cats, the period between onset of bat variant rabies shedding in saliva and development of recognizable signs of rabies has not yet been established for ferrets. We are aware that studies are currently underway to try ot determine a virus shedding period for the bat variant strain of rabies virus in ferrets, but these studies have not been completed. 28. This is of penultimate importance in Michigan because the overwhelming majority of rabies positive animals in Michigan are bats presumed to be infected with the bat variant strain. In the last 5 years, 111 of 121 (92%) of rabid animals were bats. In addition, the characterization of rabies virus isolates from rabid animals other than bats that were tested, indicates that the vast majority are caused by the bat variant strain. 29. While the ferret rabies virus shedding period for the skunk rabies variant and the raccoon rabies variant have been studied, the ferret shedding period for the bat rabies virus has not. 30. Studies show that there are significant differences in the ferret rabies virus shedding period between the skunk rabies variant and raccoon rabies variant; thus we know that the virus variants are not homogeneous. It is therefore possible that once studied, the bat rabies variant shedding period may be lengthy. 31. Information provided by the Bay County Animal Control and the exposed individual himself imply that a true through-the-skin bite exposure to saliva of the ferret at issue is likely to have occured. 32. Our department is compelled to recommend that the ferret at issue be immediately euthanized and tested for rabies of on the basis of the careful consideration of: 1) the individual circumstances of this exposure incident, 2) the Michigan specific facts about rabies cited above, 3) the body of knowledge about rabies and in particular the lack of data on the shedding of the bat-variant strain of the rabies virus in ferrets, and 4) the current recommendations of the national authorities responsible for forming public health policy concerning rabies prevention as set out in the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) March 22, 1991 and the National Association of State Ppublic Health Veterinarians compendium of Animal Rabies Control for 1992 and 1997. There ya go, the "official" document as submitted to the appellate court by the attorney general of Michigan. except for my typos it's typed over verbatum from the document as I recieved it. You tell me what's up with this!!! [Posted in FML issue 1940]