By Scott Weese on Posted in Cats,Dogs,Horses,Other animals,Rabies,VaccinationThe Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA) has launched its new (and long-awaited) rabies website. The site includes a section for the public which is an ideal resource for clients, and a section for veterinarians with detailed information about reporting, risk assessment, sample submission and testing, and post-exposure management (for companion animals and… Continue Reading
By Maureen Anderson on Posted in Other animals,Other diseasesA new study from the University of California, Berkeley, has shown a potential link between bovine leukemia virus (BLV) and breast cancer in women (Buehring et al. 2015). The short version is the study analyzed breast tissue from 239 women, and found evidence of BLV exposure in 59% of the samples from women with breast… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Cats,Dogs,Horses,MRSA/MRSP,Other animalsI realize this is outside of the scope of most readers (so let me apologize in advance for some wasted electrons), but here’s a quick announcement of the 4th ASM/ESCMID Conference on methicillin-resistant staphylococci in animals; animals and human health implications. (Yes, the name’s a bit long and drawn out, and I probably take the… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsAccording to Groundhog Day lore, if the groundhog sees its shadow, you’re in for six more weeks of winter. If it doesn’t spring is around the corner. So, what does it mean when the critter draws blood? Sun Prairie, Wisconsin residents will find out this year, after Jimmy the Groundhog bit the town’s mayor. After… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsI go on periodic rants about people abusing service animal rules to take their pets places they cannot normally go (while potentially compromising the critically important need for true service animals to have unfettered access). Sometimes, it’s nice to know I’m not the only one. A recent article (pointed out by a writer from the VIN… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsThe salmonellosis outbreak in the US associated with hatching chicks continues to expand. The outbreak, ironically associated with Mt. Healthy Hatcheries in Ohio, has now sickened at least 344 people in 42 US states and Puerto Rico with a variety of Salmonella serotypes (S. Infants, S. Newport and S. Hadar). The outbreak shows no sign… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsThe US Food and Drug Administration has released the 2011 NARMS (National Antimicrobial Resistances Monitoring System) executive report. It’s a good-news/bad-news outcome, which may be as good as can be expected, but at least there’s some good news. Here are some areas that were highlighted by the FDA. Eighty-five percent of non-typhoidal Salmonella collected from humans… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsWhat zoonotic microorganisms do pangolins commonly carry? Are some pangolins higher risk than others? What infection control measures should be used? I don’t know, and from a cursory review of the literature, I don’t think anyone really knows. So, do we really want to be exposing them to some of our most susceptible individuals –… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animals"A monkey was placed under a six-month quarantine on Tuesday after it reportedly bit a woman at a Beaumont restaurant on Sunday…" Oh, where to start… Why do people feel the need to have monkeys as pets? I realize that they’re fascinating critters, but is it in the best interests of the monkey and the… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsMERS-CoV, the Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus, continues to cause infections (often fatal) and confusion. For a while now, there’s been speculation that camels are the source of this virus, based in part on how commonly antibodies against the virus (or a related virus) are found in healthy camels. It always seemed strange, though, for… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsCamels are getting a lot of bad press on the infectious disease front lately. There’s been the ongoing question of their role in the epidemiology of the very serious Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV). This enigmatic virus (like the similarly deadly SARS coronavirus) is a tremendous public health concern, with high deaths rates in… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsThat’s a great title that I can’t take credit for. A colleague (and regular supplier of papers for blog posts) Dr. Stephen Page send me a paper from the Journal of Clinical Microbiology with a more convoluted title “The Capnocytophaga canimosus isolate that caused sepsis in an immunosufficient man was transmitted by the large pine… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsApril showers bring May flowers. …and I can’t come up with a good rhyme for salmonellosis. Nonetheless, it’s Salmonella season, courtesy of cute but biohazardous baby poultry. You can buy chicken, turkey and other bird eggs to hatch every spring. Our local feed mill had the order forms out a while ago, and you can… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsLet’s put this one in the "smart people doing stupid things" file. Some well-intentioned people at Washington University in St. Louis thought they’d help relieve stress during exam time by bringing in a petting zoo – that unfortunately included "Boo Boo" the biting bear. As you can likely guess, problems ensued. 18 students sustained skin-breaking… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsThere’s been some controversy in the past regarding allowing pets to sleep in or on the bed. I don’t get too worked up about it, since I think it’s very low-risk in terms of disease transmission for most pets and households, but a variety if reasons for prohibiting this practice have been given. I haven’t… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsThe first North American case of H5N1 avian influenza ("bird flu") was confirmed in an Alberta resident last night, causing much concern but posing little true risk. The affected person had just returned from a trip to China and began showing signs of illness during the flight from Beijing to Vancouver. After spending a few… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsThese days, there’s more and more doom-and-gloom information about multidrug-resistant bacteria. They’re in our hospitals, medical tourists, people on the street, our pets, our food, and pretty much anywhere else you can think of. We can now add crow poop to the list too. It’s almost to be expected, really. We know that birds can… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsIn my line of work, I deal with feces from a lot of different species. Never once, however, have I thought to model defecation pressure and distances. Maybe I’m just strange. A few years ago, German researchers felt the need to model the defecation habits of penguins. The title of the paper, published in Polar… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsAustralian Elmer Fudds beware… there are concerns that feral pig hunting is a risk factor for brucellosis in New South Wales. Brucellosis is a rare disease, but a report like this raises concern because it can be nasty, and it can also be hard to diagnose (or it’s not considered right away). We don’t have… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsAntibiotic use in animals, and the impact on humans is a controversial area. At a conference a few years ago, one of the organizers posed the question, "What percentage of resistance in human pathogens is attributable to antibiotic use in animals?" They had people write their answers on cards, and later in the day they… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsDarwin’s back in the news. He’s a young macaque who is often called the "Ikea Monkey" since he was found wandering around a Toronto Ikea parking lot one day last winter in a designer winter coat. He was seized because of a Toronto bylaw prohibiting monkeys as pets, and transferred to a local primate sanctuary.… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsI’ve written about the African dwarf frog and Salmonella issue before, but it’s worth a recap since an overview of the 2008-2011 outbreak was recently published in the journal Pediatrics (Mettee Zarecki et al 2013). The fact that reptiles and amphibians can carry Salmonella is nothing new, nor is the fact that outbreaks of disease… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsI’ve been bitten lots of times, some on the job (including the last dog I saw when I was in general practice) and some off (including a dog down the road a couple of years ago). Fortunately, I haven’t suffered any serious consequences. That’s what happens most of the time. However, bad things can and do… Continue Reading
By Scott Weese on Posted in Other animalsAllegedly, spring is here. The foot of snow on the ground and minus double-digit temperatures don’t really convince me, but the calendar can’t lie, I guess. Anyway, spring brings with it many things, one of which is hatching chicks. I saw signs for them at a local farm supply store a couple of days ago,… Continue Reading
