Just read this article online . Parvovirus can be fatal for puppies and older dogs so please be careful and check that your dog, of whatever age, is fully vaccinated. https://www.manchestereveningnews.c...irus-sweeping-14476748#ICID=sharebar_facebook
"Nurse Kelly Terry of Avenue Veterinary Centre in Grantham said: "Whenever you buy puppies make sure they have been vaccinated, some less reputable breeders may not have given them their vaccination, or may have only done the first one."" That's a bit harsh! If you pick your puppy up at eight weeks, I wouldn't really expect the breeder to have done the first injection. It doesn't make them "less reputable". And "may only have done the first one"... well, again, if you're picking your pup up at 8 weeks, what do they expect?! Nurse Kelly has either been misquoted or is a bit of a special one, I think. I do feel terribly sad for the puppies and owners in the article, but if the breeder says that the puppy has been vaccinated, then there should have been a vaccination card.
I wonder how much of this increase is down to people deliberately choosing not to vaccinate because, y'know, vaccines are poison and chemicals and Big Pharma is out to get us.
I agree with @snowbunny. However, the puppy farm bred puppies are often rife with parvovirus. I remember when it first appeared and the vets used to vaccinate with cat vaccine before a dog vaccine was made available.
Parvo's doing its deadly rounds around Porirua, but its victims have been in the lower income areas. People buy puppies on the buy/sell/trade pages and then don't take them to the vet. The good news is that one of the local vets has said that in her career she's never seen a fully vaccinated dog come down with parvo.
In my puppy/breeder search, I did come across a few breeders saying not to vaccinate or to vaccinate at a much different/lighter schedule than what is considered standard veterinary practice. I actually found their arguments pretty persuasive, but as I'm also completely paranoid about parvo (and distemper, rabies, giardia and the rest), all it really did was make me worry even more about the whole thing. I've seen what parvo does, so I would never not vaccinate, but I do find the amount of vaccinations and other preventative treatments given to puppies in their first six months rather daunting. I agree that it has a lot to do with culture and education. I regularly see tiny puppies toddling around the beach or in the streets here with their new owners who don't have a clue. After saying hi and asking to pet the puppy, I try my best gently gently approach to tell them they shouldn't have their puppy down and that it could be fatal. It never works. I'm quite sure even the nicest ones think, "What a crazy lady" and simply continue on. And let's face it, there is a certain element here that if you can buy a puppy for 20 Euro at the market, it's cheaper to just replace him once he dies from some disease than to get him vaccinated or treated if he comes down sick.
I think (as does the WSAVA http://www.wsava.org/WSAVA/media/PDF_old/2011_VetRecord_EditorialVaccination.pdf) that once a year is unnecessary for the core vaccines and, if I had a choice, I would use triennial vaccines and would certainly investigate titre testing. I'm not certain I would choose it, but it would be something I would research and consider. I would not consider leaving my dogs vulnerable to infection - not for their sake, and not for the sake of herd immunity. There is an alternative - you ensure that your puppy has absolutely no possibility of exposure until he is 16 weeks, and give him his one and only dose then, when you can be (almost) sure that the MDA has gone. Of course, that has other implications which may be more damaging than the vaccinations - so it's all about balancing risk With Luna, the vet in the UK gave me a dose of Advocate to use with her. I smiled politely and took it (it was "free" as part of their puppy programme) but didn't administer it as I didn't believe there was a need. She wasn't going to be exposed to the problems it covered and, if she did get fleas I'd have treated them at the time. She didn't I do use Advocate now on all my dogs so it's not that I think it's an evil drug but at that time I didn't think it was necessary for a very young puppy.
I don't think it necessary to use flea prevention unless the dog/cat has fleas! My vet does two puppies vaccinations, then Lepto every year and the others every three years. Having seen dogs die of Lepto, Parvovirus and Distemper, I would rather vaccinate than not.
I’m always too panicked to not give flea and tick treatment because I’d absolutely die if he got either. We vaccinate but we have to for his dog walker/day care.
Flea prevention for me is simply a side effect of the other things I'm treating for. I use Advantix for tick repellant - we have loads of ticks - and Advocate because of the heartworm prevention. Heartworm is scary
I use flea spoton not for fleas as I have never seen any on either of my dogs but for the damn ticks, I hate them. Already taken two off Charlie this week Our vet vaccinates for Lepto every year and whatever the others are every three years. I trust her to do what's best for my dogs. x
The media are renowned for misquoting or editing what people say in their reporting. Having said that yes I do expect a breeder to have the first vaccination done at the same time they have the puppy vet checked and microchipped. I was also reading advice from the Blue Cross which said that if collecting a puppy from a breeder or a rescue centre to ensure that that the puppy was vaccinated, with a vaccination certificate/record, as the vaccinations could be given from 6 weeks of age onwards. Last year 2 puppies in a neighbouring village, less the 2 miles from me, died from Parvo and I was reading earlier today of yet another puppy that had died in the county of parvo, so yes I do think that breeders have a role, and a responsibility, in the health of our puppies. I'm also seeing a huge increase in kennel cough at the moment - 3 clients in the last week, who all live in different areas that I cover and the rescue I was training at last week were recovering from an outbreak of kennel cough. So are people not vaccinating? Pinning their hopes on herd protection? Or just irresponsible? I know I find it very demoralising when these are diseases we can defeat with a vaccine
Xena's now on three yearly for one of the vaccines, and yearly for the other (parvo or kennel cough). Lepto is only an issue in the northern half of the North Island, so she'll only need to be vaccinated for that if we were to travel up there with her. We had such a stinking hot summer this year that Xena came down with fleas, so I bought the Seresto collar. I don't have to worry about ticks, so that's a blessing. I worm routinely every 3 months. Kennel cough is one of those illnesses that can be caught, even if the dog is vaccinated. My friend's dog (she's a vet) came down with it!
Totally agree as the vaccine only covers the most common strands of the disease so there is a risk of still becoming ill with kennel cough. That said I've just heard of too many cases recently, from different areas, not to be concerned.
I hope it's ok to copy and paste an entire article, but I found this especially informative, namely as it comes from Dr. Schultz. "March 14, 2003 Once a year, Ronald Schultz checks the antibody levels in his dogs’ blood. Why? He says for proof that most annual vaccines are unnecessary. Schultz, professor and chair of pathobiological sciences at School of Veterinary Medicine, has been studying the effectiveness of canine vaccines since the 1970s; he’s learned that immunity can last as long as a dog’s lifetime, which suggests that our “best friends” are being over-vaccinated. Based on his findings, a community of canine vaccine experts has developed new veterinary recommendations that could eliminate a dog’s need for annual shots. The guidelines appear in the March/April issue of Trends, the journal of the American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA). Every year, when we take our dogs to the veterinarian’s office, they could receive up to 16 different vaccines, many of which are combined into a single shot. Four of these products protect against life-threatening diseases, including rabies, canine parvovirus type 2 (CPV-2), canine distemper virus (CDV) and canine adenovirus type 2 (CAV-2); the rest protect against milder diseases to which only some dogs are exposed, including Lyme disease. But, as many veterinarians are realizing, over-vaccination can actually jeopardize a dog’s health and even life. Side effects can cause skin problems, allergic reactions and autoimmune disease. Though the case in cats, not dogs, tumors have been reported at the site of vaccine injections. “These adverse reactions have caused many veterinarians to rethink the issue of vaccination,” says Schultz. “The idea that unnecessary vaccines can cause serious side effects is in direct conflict with sound medical practices.” For 30 years, Schultz has been examining the need to vaccinate animals so often and for so many diseases. “In the 1970s, I started thinking about our immune response to pathogens and how similar it is in other animals,” says Schultz. “That’s when I started to question veterinary vaccination practices.” Just like ours, a canine’s immune system fires up when a pathogen, like a virus, enters the body. The pathogen releases a protein called an antigen, which calls into action the immune system’s special disease-fighting cells. Called B and T lymphocytes, these cells not only destroy the virus, but they remember what it looked like so they can fend it off in the future. It’s this immunological memory that enables vaccines, which purposely contain live, weakened or dead pathogens, to protect against future disease. But, as Schultz points out, vaccines can keep people immune for a lifetime: we’re usually inoculated for measles, mumps and rubella as children but never as adults. So, can dogs be vaccinated as pups and then never again? While evidence from Schultz’s studies on both his own dogs and many other dogs from controlled studies suggests the answer is yes, Schultz recommends a more conservative plan based on duration of immunity and individual risk. Schultz says that core vaccines, or the ones that protect against life-threatening disease, are essential for all dogs, yet he does not recommend dogs receive these shots yearly. “With the exception of rabies, the vaccines for CDV, CPV-2 and CAV trigger an immunological memory of at least seven years,” he explains. (Studies testing the duration of immunity for rabies shots show it lasts about three years.) For these reasons, Schultz suggests that dogs receive rabies shots every three years (as is required by law in most states) and the other core vaccines no more frequently than every three years. Some non-core vaccines, on the other hand, have a much shorter duration of immunity, lasting around one year. But, as Schultz points out, not every dog should get these types of vaccines, because not every dog is at risk for exposure. Today, many vaccinated dogs receive a shot for Lyme disease. However, Schultz says that the ticks carrying the Lyme disease pathogen can be found in only a few regions of the United States. More importantly, Schultz adds, “The vaccine can cause adverse effects such as mild arthritis, allergy or other immune diseases. Like all vaccines, it should only be used when the animal is at significant risk.” He notes that the Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital at the UW–Madison School of Veterinary Medicine rarely administers the Lyme disease vaccine. Another common vaccine that Schultz says is unnecessary protects against “kennel cough,” an often mild and transient disease contracted during boarding or dog shows. “Most pet dogs that do not live in breeding kennels, are not boarded, do not go to dog shows and have only occasional contact with dogs outside their immediate family,” Schultz recommends, “rarely need to be vaccinated or re-vaccinated for kennel cough.” Schultz says that it’s important for veterinarians to recognize an individual dog’s risk for developing a particular disease when considering the benefits of a vaccine. “Vaccines have many exceptional benefits, but, like any drug, they also have the potential to cause significant harm.” Giving a vaccine that’s not needed, he explains, creates an unnecessary risk to the animal. Recommending that dogs receive fewer vaccines, Schultz admits, may spark controversy, especially when veterinarians rely on annual vaccines to bring in clients, along with income. But, as he mentions, annual visits are important for many reasons other than shots. “Checking for heartworm, tumors, dermatological problems and tooth decay should be done on a yearly basis,” he says. “Plus, some dogs, depending on their risk, may need certain vaccines annually.” Rather than vaccinating on each visit, veterinarians can use a recently developed test which checks dogs’ immunity against certain diseases. Schultz adds that veterinarians who have switched to the three-year, instead of annual, vaccination program have found no increase in the number of dogs with vaccine-preventable diseases. “Everyday, more and more people in the profession are embracing the change,” notes Schultz. And, that the new vaccination guidelines supported by the AAHA, along with the task force members representing the American Colleges of Veterinary Internal Medicine, Veterinary Microbiology and the American Association of Veterinary Immunologists, is evidence of just that." Source : news.wisc.edu/schultz-dog-vaccines-may-not-be-necessary/
