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Old April 11th, 2012, 03:17 PM
Longblades Longblades is offline
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Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 2,528
I don't want to unecessarily frighten anyone but a dog can be taken away to quarantine and not have bitten anyone. It almost happened to a lady at work. Her dog, fully vaccinated, brought a freshly killed bat in after her morning pee. Lady played it safe, shut her dog in the house and took the bat to her Vet. The bat tested positive for rabies and the Vet had to report it to Health of Animals branch of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food.

The lady had to get rabies shots, just to be safe. Once she knew the dog had a bat in her mouth she was very careful in her handling but, just to be safe.

The dog had to be quarantined for, I don't remember how long. The Health of Animals inspector visited the lady's home and because her tall fences were very secure she was allowed to quarantine the dog at her home. Otherwise it would have had to be at an approved kennel somewhere.

Here's the interesting part. While the lady was at her Vet, or maybe it was at her Doctor's but anyway, while she was away her daughter dropped in for a visit and had her own dog with her. You can guess, can't you? Daughter had a key, let herself and her dog in, let both dogs out into the back yard to play.

YUp, BOTH dogs had to be quarantined. The daughter did not have to get rabies shots, she had not been bitten and had not handled the bat. And she was also allowed to quarantine at home but the Health of Animals inspector in her area had to visit her home too, to OK her yard.

Choochi, and I think the OP, are worried the dog might be taken and destroyed as that is the only way to test for rabies if the dog is unvaccinated and has bitten a person. But the dog can be taken away for a period of time and I have no doubt it would be at the owner's expense.

Rabies is a serious threat to human health and the possiblity of it is not taken lightly. If a vaccinated dog, or cat, bites a human it will not likely be destroyed but it will be quarantined. If a vaccinated dog or cat itself is bitten by a suspect animal it likely will be quarantined. No vaccine is 100% foolproof. When my dog tangled with porcupine my Vet said count my lucky stars it wasn't a skunk. We are a rabies hot spot for skunks, or we were, and even a tangle with a seemingly healthy skunk would have required my Vet to report the incident and he was sure the dog would have to be quarantined.

No report back yet from the OP? Hope it went OK.
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