Rabies Vaccine - It's Not Just For Dogs & Cats

Veterinarian View

Health & Reproduction questions - answered and explained.

contributed article by Vince Collison DVM

Collison Embryo | Collison Veterinary Services PC collisonembryo.com

RABIES VACCINE - IT’S NOT JUST FOR DOGS & CATS

September 2019

When I was in veterinary school, a horse came into the clinics with a severe colic. The horse went into surgery and nothing obvious was found during the exploratory. A few intestines were moved around the abdomen, and the horse was closed up. During the recovery from anesthesia, the horse, once again, started to colic. The surgeon on the case immediately did a biopsy on the horse’s lip and took it up to the diagnostic lab. Within the hour, we had a positive diagnosis for rabies! We had all been examining the horse’s mouth on the initial exam, and the student health center required all of us to get a booster vaccination for rabies. This resulted in a resident and me experiencing severe reactions to the vaccine. The horse was euthanized. All of this could have been prevented had the horse received a rabies vaccine.

During my time in practice, I have only been involved with one case of rabies in a kitten and one case in a dog. Other than skunks and bats, most of the rabies we have seen has been in cattle and horses. The main reason to bring this up is that many people do not think about rabies in cattle or horses. I think that we have seen very little rabies in cats and dogs because of the regular use of the vaccine in small animals. There are rabies vaccines approved for horses and cattle.

We have always recommended that owners vaccinate their horses for rabies at the time they do their West Nile and EWT vaccinations. We do not normally recommend vaccinating cattle for rabies, but if you live in a rabies endemic area, this is something to consider for your high-value cattle. Most show cattle, donors and sires that have semen sales have values that are higher than the average commodity cattle. For the minimal cost of the rabies vaccine, you can prevent a 100% fatal disease.

The way rabies affects an animal or human is that the virus travels via the nerves from the location of the bite from a rabid animal to the brain where it causes fatal neurological damage. Rabies can incubate for as long as six months in an animal that is bitten in the hind leg by a rabid animal. The shortest incubation occurs when an animal is bitten in the head and the distance the virus travels on neurons is shortest. Once an animal shows signs of rabies, the damage is done and cannot be reversed with treatment. I have never seen a case of rabies where the owner knew when the animal was infected. Often when an animal shows symptoms, the infection occurred several months earlier. In Iowa, the main source of rabies is skunks. Large animals are naturally curious and could easily have an encounter with a rabid skunk, and the owner would never know. One other point to remember is that an infected animal will start to shed rabies virus in their saliva two weeks prior to showing symptoms. If you would see an animal acting strangely, don’t touch it around the mouth. Do not try to help a wild animal or feral cat if it is not obvious what is wrong.

In one case I had a call early one evening in regards to a baby squirrel that was not acting very well. I told them to just leave the squirrel alone. The next morning I received a call that the squirrel had died, but they tried to hand feed the squirrel with an eye dropper after we had talked on the phone. Even though squirrels normally don’t show rabies, we decided to send the squirrel in for rabies testing. The squirrel did end up positive for rabies, and five people had to undergo a series of rabies vaccinations. In that case, the diagnostic lab had never seen a case of rabies in a squirrel before and ran the test several times before calling it positive. So just remember to be cautious with any animal acting strangely.

If you own horses we recommend vaccinating them for rabies. If you have cattle with added value such as show animals, donors, etc. you may want to consider giving them rabies vaccine. As with any herd issue it is best to consult your veterinarian as to the best way to implement rabies prevention into a vaccination program.

learn more collisionembryo.com

Dr. Vince Collison is co-owner of Collison Embryo | Collison Veterinary Services PC in Rockwell City, IA.

September 2019

THE STOCKMAN | stockmanmag.com