To Vaccinate Or Not?

[Blackdogs]

Friend's dog brought it back from a national speciality a few years back - dog attended trial when it still had no symptoms and news of the outbreak hadn't broken.

Dog infected a number of dogs at the trial, some of her friends dogs and those of us who'd had contact quarantined our dogs as a precaution. Lots of entry fees for several weekends for lots of dogs went south.

It may only be an "inconvenient" disease but it has the potential to inconvenience a LOT of people beyond you. It can inconvenience people out of matings, titles, national attendances....Ask Customs - they had an entire kennel of dogs requiring quarantine a few years ago. I believe they vaccinate for it now.

Vaccinate or not for KC, your prerogative. But please quarantine your dogs if you have contact with KC - or indeed anything else. The lives of other dogs may depend on it. And you'd think this was common sense but FFS do NOT take a dog with a cough or diarrhoea to an event!!!

That's funny. My dog comes to work (vet) and has since he was a puppy. His last vaccine was at 16weeks and (touch wood) he's never contracted anything.

Has he been titred? The presence of a dog of questionable immunity at my local vets would piss me off big time. What a dog contracts and what a dog can incubate and spread are not one and the same thing.

Actually Haredown, The dog with "questionable" immunity, according to the WSAVA paper will have adequate protection. It has been vaccinated several times and a normal dog will seroconvert.

Also, if it regularly visits a place such a a vet hospital it will have developed a good "wild" type of immunity (or street immunity as it used to be called) simply because it has been placed in a situation where it will have exposure to all sorts of bugs and viruses...... sick dogs go to vet hospitals too !!

It will be a very healthy and strong individual.

"What a dog contracts and what a dog can incubate and spread are not one and the same thing."

I dont understand what you mean by this. Could you please elaborate a little bit more.

Just one more word on KC. It's possible for KC to be passed from human to dog. Some of the bacterial upper respiratory bugs that we get can be transferred to our dogs via aerosol contamination (ie when we cough), so to blame another dog for passing on the disease is not always correct. Some of the bordatella infections that we get are also the same as those that dogs get. We dont quarantine people who have a cough..... half the country's population would be locked at home if we did.

Dont get me wrong, I'm not saying that coughing dogs should not be kept at home, I'm just drawing attention to the fact that there are other sources of U/R infections in dogs and the matter is not as simple as many would like to think.

A lot of people dont understand immunology well.

Do you have any sources to support the idea that humans can transmit KC to dogs?

[tdierikx]

Funnily enough, I seemed to get a cold around the same time as I had a foster litter with KC... on more than one occasion...

Possibly sympathy illness, but it was the root of much mirth for all my doggy friends telling me that either I'd given it to the pups or vice versa...

You'd be amazed at what lovely diseases we can share with our pets, or contract from them... most of them are rare transmissions, but they CAN happen.

Don't Google zoonotic transmission unless you want to get a clean complex... errr!

T.

[Wundahoo]

Friend's dog brought it back from a national speciality a few years back - dog attended trial when it still had no symptoms and news of the outbreak hadn't broken.

Dog infected a number of dogs at the trial, some of her friends dogs and those of us who'd had contact quarantined our dogs as a precaution. Lots of entry fees for several weekends for lots of dogs went south.

It may only be an "inconvenient" disease but it has the potential to inconvenience a LOT of people beyond you. It can inconvenience people out of matings, titles, national attendances....Ask Customs - they had an entire kennel of dogs requiring quarantine a few years ago. I believe they vaccinate for it now.

Vaccinate or not for KC, your prerogative. But please quarantine your dogs if you have contact with KC - or indeed anything else. The lives of other dogs may depend on it. And you'd think this was common sense but FFS do NOT take a dog with a cough or diarrhoea to an event!!!

That's funny. My dog comes to work (vet) and has since he was a puppy. His last vaccine was at 16weeks and (touch wood) he's never contracted anything.

Has he been titred? The presence of a dog of questionable immunity at my local vets would piss me off big time. What a dog contracts and what a dog can incubate and spread are not one and the same thing.

Actually Haredown, The dog with "questionable" immunity, according to the WSAVA paper will have adequate protection. It has been vaccinated several times and a normal dog will seroconvert.

Also, if it regularly visits a place such a a vet hospital it will have developed a good "wild" type of immunity (or street immunity as it used to be called) simply because it has been placed in a situation where it will have exposure to all sorts of bugs and viruses...... sick dogs go to vet hospitals too !!

It will be a very healthy and strong individual.

"What a dog contracts and what a dog can incubate and spread are not one and the same thing."

I dont understand what you mean by this. Could you please elaborate a little bit more.

Just one more word on KC. It's possible for KC to be passed from human to dog. Some of the bacterial upper respiratory bugs that we get can be transferred to our dogs via aerosol contamination (ie when we cough), so to blame another dog for passing on the disease is not always correct. Some of the bordatella infections that we get are also the same as those that dogs get. We dont quarantine people who have a cough..... half the country's population would be locked at home if we did.

Dont get me wrong, I'm not saying that coughing dogs should not be kept at home, I'm just drawing attention to the fact that there are other sources of U/R infections in dogs and the matter is not as simple as many would like to think.

A lot of people dont understand immunology well.

Do you have any sources to support the idea that humans can transmit KC to dogs?

I dont have the references close at hand, (I'm not at work right now), however I'm aware that some bordetella sp, respiratory coronavirus and strep can be transmitted from human to dog and will cause upper respiratory signs.

[cali]

I do limited vaccines. I used to vaccinate at 16 weeks and then just titre thereafter, currently I follow the jean dodds protocol, but only because I work in a dog kennel now, so the exposure risk is a tad higher. but to be clear I did not switch my dogs to Dodds protocol, I just follow it with new dogs, dogs I had before my current job have not been vaccinated since puppyhood and will not be unless needed(which thus far has been never..) and Happy will simply never be vaccinated reguardless as she has severe reactions.

as for flea/tick/heartworm stuff, no, there is no heartworm

where I live, fleas are rare and while we have ticks by the boatload they do not carry any diseases so they are nothing more then annoying and gross.

[VizslaMomma]

I do limited vaccines. I used to vaccinate at 16 weeks and then just titre thereafter, currently I follow the jean dodds protocol, but only because I work in a dog kennel now, so the exposure risk is a tad higher. but to be clear I did not switch my dogs to Dodds protocol, I just follow it with new dogs, dogs I had before my current job have not been vaccinated since puppyhood and will not be unless needed(which thus far has been never..) and Happy will simply never be vaccinated reguardless as she has severe reactions.

I can recall the horror of finding out that the vaccinations caused 'my' boy to have issues.

Luckily I choose no guilt trip.

I live happily with the choice of no more vaccinations plus have the guidance of a fabulous Vet. :)

[mita]

The reason I continue to vaccinate, even my senior girl, is in the event of an emergency & they have to board at kennels. The only specific kennels I'll consider for the tibbies, insists on current vaccination status.

And this situation has just come up. It's a huge relief to know the girls will be going to a kennels I trust completely.