When we have discussions about the risks of feeding raw meat to dogs and cats, a frequent refrain is “where are the published reports of people getting sick?” While we know some illnesses occur, they tend not to get investigated to the level that they are published, which is problematic when trying to demonstrate the
One more reason to avoid rattlesnake pills
Not that I needed one more reason to avoid them, but a recent CDC release warns about the risk of Salmonella infection associated with rattlesnake pills. These pills, a literal variation of the old “snake oil” remedies, are apparently marketed as a cure for a variety of ailments, including cancer and HIV.
Infections from backyard poultry
Hardly a week goes by that I don’t get a question (or a dozen) about backyard poultry. As more cities consider or enact laws allowing urban poultry, the debates about and around this issue increase. It’s also becoming a big business, with ample options for people to buy chicken coops (or high end chicken condos),
Small Turtles + Kids = Salmonellosis…No surprise here
It’s not a shocker, but another multistate turtle-associated outbreak of salmonellosis has been ongoing in the US. CDC has reported on an outbreak of Salmonella Agbeni infections involving 37 people in 13 states. As is almost always the case, the number of reported infections is probably a small fraction of the number of people
Bandicoots, Sandboxes and Salmonella
A playground in New South Wales, Australia, has been closed because its sandpit was linked to salmonellosis in two children. Sandboxes are a potential source of a few different infectious diseases since they can be used as litterboxes by animals such as cats, raccoons, and apparently, bandicoots.
In the Australian incident, two kids
Biohazardous hedgehogs…multistate salmonellosis outbreak
When I talk about hospital visitation animals, I often use hedgehogs as an example of a novelty critter that we want to keep out of high risk situations. They’re interesting, but is there any advantage f seeing a hedgehog vs interacting with a properly trained visitation dog? Probably not. When you add in the greater
Backyard poultry…knowledge, attitudes and practices
The backyard poultry debate continues in many areas. It raised is head again in Guelph recently, with more city government debate about how far you have to keep your backyard chickens from your neighbours. There are a number of issues to consider, like potential for spread of zoonotic bacteria (e.g. Salmonella), avian flu, noise,
The Indoor/Outdoor Cat Debate
The latest edition of the Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery contains an American Association of Feline Practitioners (AAFP) position statement entitled “Impact of lifestyle choice on the companion cat: indoor vs outdoor”. (The document is actually an update of the previous 2007 position statement “Confinement of Owned Indoor Cats“.) It’s
Tiny Turtles, Big Problems
The CDC has updated information on the ongoing (if not ever-present) salmonellosis outbreaks linked to pet turtles. At last count, there were 133 illnesses (although it’s likely that this represents a fraction of the people that actually got sick), with 38 of those requiring hospitalization. Forty-one percent (41%) were kids under the age of
More Turtle-Associated Salmonellosis
In what shouldn’t come as a surprise, I guess, another pet turtle-associated multistate outbreak of Salmonella infection in people has been identified in the US. Despite the fact that the sale of small (<4 inch shell length) turtles has been banned in the US for decades, the law is widely ignored, and kids get