Rabies is one of the most well-known diseases as it is fatal in animals and humans. It is caused by a virus that infects the nervous system and can lead to increased salivation, aggression and death. Rabies virus is transmitted through animal bites, and is found in wildlife such as bats, raccoons, foxes, and skunks.

Canine distemper virus attacks the respiratory, gastrointestinal, and nervous systems and can be fatal. Dogs that survive may have lifelong complications. Wildlife such as coyotes, raccoons, skunks, and foxes may also be infected.

Canine parvovirus can cause severe vomiting and diarrhea (often bloody), and can lead to sudden death in unvaccinated puppies. It is one of the most lethal infections of dogs and is transmitted through contact with an infected animal stool.

Canine adenovirus causes coughing, sneezing and infectious canine hepatitis (ICH). Clinical signs can range from mild fever to death; it is rare because of effective vaccination programs for dogs. Current vaccines for canine adenovirus protect against both diseases.

Feline parvovirus, also known as panleukopenia, is a highly fatal virus particularly in kittens and causes diarrhea and decreases in white blood cells. The virus is very contagious and can be spread directly from infected feces and fluids.

Feline herpesvirus causes a disease of the upper respiratory tract, also known as viral rhinotracheitis. Kittens and cats may have runny noses and eye infections leading to pneumonia, and cats can be carriers for life. The disease can be fatal, particularly in combination with other viruses or bacteria, and is spread from infected oral, nasal, and ocular fluids.

Feline calicivirus causes clinical signs similar to feline rhinotracheitis; cats may present with mouth sores or lameness.

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Rabies is virtually always a fatal disease to all mammals, and zoonotic to humans with no curative treatment once clinical signs develop. Only prevention through vaccination and strong surveillance programs have kept incidence of rabies fairly low in Canada.

The biggest reservoirs for the disease across the country are bats, skunks, raccoons, and foxes (red and Arctic). It varies across the country, but Alberta has the most reported diagnosis in bats followed by skunks and then cats. Up north, the Arctic fox can be the source and in Ontario we have diagnosed cases in foxes, raccoons and other animals. As of April 1, 2014 (even though it is still a reportable disease for veterinarians) the federal government downloaded the responsibilities to the individual provinces. This arose suddenly out of a budgetary issue in 2012 with no consultation with our national veterinary group or other affected parties. This is called passing the buck.

There were three other diseases, federal officials either dropped or downloaded including anthrax since it is costly to deal with and is considered endemic in Western Canada. Rabies, however, is the most serious zoonotic disease as anyone — whether in veterinary medicine or agriculture, and even urban folk — are at severe risk if they come in contact with a rabid animal. Globally, rabies still kills 55,000 people annually (mainly in Africa and Asia), so it is critical we maintain surveillance to keep people, pets, and farm animals protected. Veterinary clinics will still be involved, as will the provincial medical officer of health, if there has been any human exposure, such as bites from domestic or wild animals.

Everyone needs to be on the lookout for animals exhibiting abnormal behaviour including aggression, varying forms of paralysis (including inability to swallow), and excessive salivation. Lethargy, vomiting, and anorexia (not wanting to eat) are non-specific signs we can observe with rabies. Other signs can include incessant bellowing in cattle. If clinical signs develop, affected animals will die within 10 days.

Veterinary clinics may be involved, especially in isolated areas of the province, to facilitate this process. If you are suspicious of these clinical signs contact your local veterinary clinic, as they become your first line of defence.

Keep in mind rabies is very rare and many other diseases can mimic it. If any of the clinical signs listed above are seen by veterinarians, rabies is always on the differential list. Cows for instance with wooden tongue or a choke will salivate excessively, and these are two conditions that are treatable yet could at first glance indicate rabies. Likewise horses with choke salivate profusely.

Just because we haven’t heard of it or diagnosed it in a while doesn’t mean it isn’t around. Years ago, a client found a bat alive in daylight hours on his lawn acting very peculiar and unable to fly. It was submitted and was positive for rabies.

Since bats are the main reservoir in many areas, it is always advisable to vaccinate dogs and cats. In other areas of the country, such as Manitoba and Ontario, horses and even cattle are vaccinated in high-risk areas (or if they are going to be moved to high-risk areas).

There are two forms of rabies — the furious form or the paralytic form. Horses, cattle, and bats generally get the paralytic form; cats the furious form; and dogs can get either form. (Do you remember the movie “Old Yeller,” which vividly showed the aggressive form in a dog?)

The World Health Organization categorizes rabies exposure at three different levels.

The first is touching or licking from a rabid animal on intact skin. It is NOT considered exposure to rabies.

The second and third categories range from minor scratches to full depth bites and licks on broken skin. These are considered a potential exposure to rabies and where you would first get medical care and follow the guidance of the public health officer.

We are lucky in Canada because with good surveillance and vaccination of most of our pets the incidence of rabies has been kept quite low. Alberta’s famous rat patrol not only keeps rats out of the province, but does the same for skunks in the southeast of the province where the rabies incidence is higher. Saskatchewan has had cattle and horses with rabies (especially in the southern part of the province) and provincial authorities there look after surveillance (similar to what happens in Alberta). Watch in your particular region of Canada for guidance from the Office of the Chief Provincial Veterinarian.

Each province may implement it slightly differently, but the overall result should be the same. Provincial medical officers, veterinary clinics, and provincial governments all work together to monitor and keep the incidence of rabies low in Canada.

I always thought with all reportable diseases that practising veterinarians have an obligation to report to the federal veterinary authorities (CFIA) as they took the responsibility over and were the final authority. Apparently they still want to be notified or reported to. It is just they are passing the work responsibility over to the provinces.

Get a salivating animal, one acting abnormally, or showing signs of ascending paralysis checked by your veterinarian. If rabies is suspected they will know what to do.

People who might have been exposed to rabies through a bite or scratch from an animal should seek medical attention and also call Health Link at 1-800-408-5465.

Let’s work together to keep rabies a very rare event in Canada and ensure all inhabitants — people, domestic animals, production animals and wildlife — are safe. (As a side note, birds, amphibians, and reptiles can’t get rabies — and rodents only very rarely.) Watch the news for further developments. For those especially interested, there is an international conference on rabies at the University of Calgary Veterinary Medicine in October.

Everyone — including livestock producers, pet owners, wildlife officers, public health officials, and veterinarians — need to be ever vigilant for the possibility of rabies appearing. Just as this article has gone to press a positive rabid skunk was detected in southern Alberta. It’s the first since 1994 and this discovery shows that surveillance is working.

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The most common way to get rabies is from a bite of an animal with the disease. Infection through fresh wounds or mucous membranes is less likely but possible, Stoltenow says.

Recently, a bat with rabies was reported in Minnesota. The woman who was bitten was not going to submit it for testing until her son told her to do so.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says people can’t tell if a bat has rabies just by looking at it. Rabies only can be confirmed in a laboratory.

However, any bat that is active by day or is found in a place where bats usually are not seen, such as in a home or on a lawn, might be rabid. A bat that is unable to fly and can be approached easily could be sick.

Here are some prevention tips:

Avoid contact with bats, skunks or raccoons.

Make sure dogs, cats, ferrets, horses and high-value or frequently handled livestock have current rabies vaccinations.

Do not perform oral exams on animals that appear to have difficulty chewing or swallowing, exhibit any type of oral or facial paralysis or show excessive salivation. Veterinarians should use extreme caution when doing oral exams on such animals.

Contact local animal control authorities about animals you suspect have rabies.

Behavioural changes and unexplained paralysis are two indications of rabies. Other warning signs are anorexia, apprehension, nervousness, irritability, hyperactivity, isolation, lack of co-ordination, altered vocalization, changes in temperament and uncharacteristic aggressiveness.

Rabies exists in two forms: furious and dumb. Animals with the furious type are irrational and will attack other animals, people or moving objects at the slightest provocation or noise. They assume an alert position and expression with dilated pupils and may chew or swallow foreign objects. Lack of muscular co-ordination, paralysis and death follow.

Symptoms of dumb rabies include paralysis of the throat and jaw muscles, profuse salivation and difficulty swallowing. Animals may drop their jaws. Death eventually follows.

The rabies virus may be in saliva for three to five days in domestic dogs and cats and up to eight days in skunks before the animals show clinical signs that they have the disease, according to Stoltenow.

Also, signs of the disease generally take 14 to 90 days to show up in the victim of a rabid animal bite, although research shows the disease’s incubation period can be as short as nine days and as long as seven years.

“The variability is due to a variety of factors, such as the location of the wound, severity of the wound, distance from the brain, and amount and strain of the virus introduced,” he says.

Once transmitted by a bite, the virus stays at the bite site for a considerable amount of time. It replicates in muscle cells and travels along nerves to the spinal cord and brain, and then to the salivary glands.

The rabies virus will not survive outside a mammalian host in the environment for an extended period, and is killed easily by soap and water, and common disinfectants.

Initial human symptoms include apprehension, excitability, headache, fever, malaise and sensory changes at the bite site. As the disease progresses, victims suffer from paralysis, difficulty swallowing, delirium and convulsions. Eventually they go into a coma and die, usually from respiratory failure.

People who suspect they’ve been exposed to rabies should contact their doctor immediately, Stoltenow says. A rabies post-exposure prophylaxis series is available for people who have been exposed to the disease.

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North Dakota State University Extension Service veterinarian Charlie Stoltenow is urging people to prevent themselves and their animals from becoming infected.

The most common way to get rabies is from a bite of an animal with the disease. Infection through fresh wounds or mucous membranes is less likely but possible, Stoltenow says.

Ninety-six cases of rabies in animals, including 44 skunks, 15 dogs and 13 cats, were reported in North Dakota in 2006-08. Cases also were reported in horses, cattle and goats. Skunks are a primary rabies carrier in North Dakota, but any mammal can get the disease.

HERE ARE SOME PREVENTION TIPS:

Make sure dogs, cats, ferrets, horses and high-value or frequently handled livestock have current rabies vaccinations. Avoid contact with skunks, bats or raccoons.

Do not perform oral exams on animals that appear to have difficulty chewing or swallowing, exhibit any type of oral or facial paralysis or show excessive salivation. Veterinarians should use extreme caution when doing oral exams on such animals.

Contact local animal control authorities about animals you suspect have rabies.

Behavioural changes and unexplained paralysis are two indications of rabies. Other warning signs are anorexia, apprehension, nervousness, irritability, hyperactivity, isolation, lack of co-ordination, altered vocalization, changes in temperament and uncharacteristic aggressiveness.

Rabies exists in two forms: furious and dumb. Animals with the furious type are irrational and will attack other animals, people or moving objects at the slightest provocation or noise. They assume an alert position and expression with dilated pupils and may chew or swallow foreign objects. Lack of muscular co-ordination, paralysis and death follow.

Symptoms of dumb rabies include paralysis of the throat and jaw muscles, profuse salivation and difficulty swallowing. Animals may drop their jaws. Death eventually follows.

The rabies virus may be in saliva for three to five days in domestic dogs and cats and up to eight days in skunks before the animals show clinical signs that they have the disease, according to Stoltenow. Also, signs of the disease generally take 14 to 90 days to show up in the victim of a rabid animal bite, although research shows the disease’s incubation period can be as short as nine days and as long as seven years.

“The variability is due to a variety of factors, such as the location of the wound, severity of the wound, distance from the brain, and amount and strain of the virus introduced,” he says.

Once transmitted by a bite, the virus stays at the bite site for a considerable amount of time. It replicates in muscle cells and travels along nerves to the spinal cord and brain, and then to the salivary glands.

The rabies virus will not survive outside a mammalian host in the environment for an extended period of time, and is easily killed by soap and water, and common disinfectants.

Initial human symptoms include apprehension, excitability, headache, fever, malaise and sensory changes at the bite site. As the disease progresses, victims suffer from paralysis, difficulty swallowing, delirium and convulsions. Eventually they go into a coma and die, usually from respiratory failure.

People who suspect they’ve been exposed to rabies should contact their doctor immediately, Stoltenow says. A rabies postexposure prophylaxis series is available for people who have been exposed to the disease.

The post Take Steps To Prevent Against Rabies appeared first on Manitoba Co-operator.

That count includes two cases reported in Manitoba and six in Ontario, the CFIA showed in a new chart on its website, logging clinical cases and laboratory submissions. No clinical cases of rabies were recorded in 2009.

The count is down from 12 cases of bovine rabies reported during 2008, which included four in Manitoba, seven in Ontario and one in Saskatchewan.

It’s also well down from the recent high of 43 cases in bovines in 2000, seven of which were clinical cases in Ontario. Manitoba had the most cases of bovine rabies that year, at 19.

CFIA also recorded a substantially lower number of reported cases of rabies across all species in 2009, at 145 – down from 235 in 2008, and 670 in 2000.

Of the 145 cases recorded in 2009, 55 were in bats, 49 in skunks and 13 in foxes.

Out of total cases in 2009, Ontario recorded the most, at 49, followed by Manitoba and Saskatchewan at 32 and 24 respectively.

Manitoba was the top province for rabies in 2000, at 237 cases across all species, mostly in skunks (199).

The last recorded human death from rabies in Canada was in May 2007, when a 73-year-old man in central Alberta died following a bat bite in 2006. A 52-year-old B. C. man died of a bat variant of rabies in 2003, and a nine-year-old boy died of rabies in Quebec in 2000.

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