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Avian Flu and Your Dog

It seems like it was only yesterday that we were all getting news of the newest pandemic disease that would spread like wildfire!  The French lost their appetite for foie gras and liver pate, the Swiss locked their poultry indoors, and Americans enlisted prisoners in Alaska to spot infected wild birds.  The avian virus known as H5N1 was spreading to Germany, Egypt and the pandemic was raising concerns worldwide. The fear resonated in all of us with the trembling of it all because just about everyone was scared to death of catching it. The Avian flu virus which threatened to kill us all followed by who knows what next in the never ending series of descending  plagues. 

We listened closely as the news trickled slowly from Asian countries such as China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan that people were coughing SARS up on airlines and bring these bugs everywhere in North America. 

If you were on the same plane you were quarantined for months, and people ran away from you.  Airport workers wearing white masks were everywhere and hospitals filled with sanitizing bottles of alcohol gels that would disinfect your hands, cordoned off areas where you could not visit someone in the hospital.   

Toronto lost billions of dollars in tourist revenues and business died due to the SARS scare, and other cities around the world were prevented from accepting visitors.  The Asians lost about 60 billion dollars in their business revenues and were condemned for this deadly chicken disease.

Many of us were holding our breaths to see if the experts were reducing the numbers of SARS deaths, and what effect did poultry vaccinations have on detection.  

The Avian flue pandemic never really did come to be, and yet we have these global diseases that the World health Organization and others had us believing the avian flu would transfer from birds to humans. 

The H5N1 virus known as the Avian flu was mostly affecting the Asian countries but also traveled to Turkey, Egypt, and Iraq.  Approximately 154 people died from it, probably those who worked in the poultry industry. 

Whatever happened since SARS and this avian flu scare since the 2005 there has been very little to report.

  In 2006, a dog in Thailand Suphan Buri province contracted avian flu after it ingested an infected duck which previously had been only detected in cats. It appears that a dog or cat must ingest another infected animal such as a chicken or duck or bird that had the virus.  

The Maryland Department of Natural Resources reports that dogs used in game bird hunting are not considered to be at greater risk of contracting avian flu and there have been no cases in North America.  This has really pleased the duck hunters of Maryland a great deal and so that industry remains intact this year.

If a duck or fowl is suspected of being ill or affected by disease a prudent dog owner would not feed their dog any meat from the diseased fowl and avoid contact with these birds.  This seems to be the advice of the Maryland Natural Resource center with tips on prevention of Avian flu.

 The only known case is the Thailand dog that ate raw duck infected with the virus today that fact has not changed. Still in 2007 the FDA approved a vaccine for humans to safeguard against the avian flu which is not a pandemic virus.  The H5N1 is being held in stockpiles rather than being used or needed by the general public.  Then everything went quiet.  With the exception of some regular human cases in Indonesia – the past pandemics and global outbreaks of catastrophic proportions did not after all “ pan” out. In summary its best to keep your dog’s and cats away from Indonesia. 

Read more at the Center for Disease Control at:

  Avian Flu and Center for Disease Control   Written By:  Teri Salvador  Tags:   Avian Flu and dogs, H5N1 virus, center for disease control, dogs, dog flu, dog sick, Avian flu virus, dog flu virus, Avian Flu and your dog.