Thank you Marie...I will try to tone it down.

I have never said you shouldn't vaccinate at all, just to look at the facts and research the health concerns. That's all.

I am more passionate about this than I am about puppymills because this is a health issue that affects every dog in a major way. I will not stop talking about it even though there are some on here who would like me to. I would never tell those passionate about puppymills to stop talking about them.

Despite some of the negative posts, the poll results seem to indicate that awareness of the issue is increasing and that is all I wanted to achieve.

I have chosen not to get my 3 cats vaccinated again, as I had 2 cat that almost died due to vaccines. They were not littermates & both ended up back at the vet, 1 was minutes after getting home, the other was a few hours later. The one that went back right away was there overnight & had I not caught his reaction right away he would have been dead. The other one had we not taken him back to the vet at 11:30pm that night he would have been dead til morning. My cats are all indoor cats & never go out.
My Yorkie, however will continue to recieve his vaccines as I am not comfortable taking him to parks and being around other dogs without being vaccinated.
This is a very controversial subject & I believe each person has to do what they believe is right for their circumstances.
Desiree :aimeeyork

The poll results would have indicated different if more options would have been available. Marie said it very well. The first time on...any subject you've been passionate about...people disagree with you, you come back posting more links and more crossposts almost like trying to drill into people's heads to see things the way you do. That is why a lot of arguments start, people get banned or people get fed up and leave. We've lost a couple of great people in the last couple of days because of things that were posted.

When is enough going to be enough? The breeder you mentioned in the original post is me because you pm-d me questioning giving vaccinations. And like I told you in a reply, do whatever you want with your dogs. I WILL continue to give every puppy that leave my home shots.

My intention was merely to give people the resources and the sites to do their own reseach and I didn't even post those initially here if you will notice. It wasn't until Pink Martini asked me "where I was getting my research"
that I posted the citations. People could then choose to go read them or NOT. It was their decision and totally optional for them to decide. No pushiness, nothing aggressive.

I gave options in the polls for everyone knowing this membership and how involved everyone is in the health of their dogs...the option #3 was very all encompassing and allowed for a lot of freedom to do what is best for you and your pet. It was very open.

I don't know how I could I have done it differently....really.....

If people choose to view me as controversial, radical and aggressive, then I am fine with that if it makes them pay attention to an important issue such as this one. I get lots of positive feedback from people who appreciate the things I have "brought to the table" here.

I will be completely honest I did not know there was a controversy. A year or so ago my Vet started talking about alternating or what not the shots that they would get each year, that's about all I know. I will look at the links you posted and research further but can honestly tell you whatever my vet says goes. I could walk into my Vet's office and he could walk into the waiting room look at any of my animals and say "That dog/cat needs a leg removed now" and I would hand the animal over to him. Now a lot of you are thinking "what the heck" but this is how comfortable I am with my vet, he would not do anything unless it was necessary. I truely believe that he treats every animal that comes in as one of his own, nothing is about money where he is concerned. He knows every one of my 6 pets, by breed, name and personality. He knows me, my husband, and my mother. He knows us on a more personal level(he is only my vet I did not know him beforehand). My bloodhound has had two surgeries and possibly going to need a third and in the end we will have only paid for the first. I have walked out of an appoinment for one of my other dogs and he told me not to worry about the bill. Everyone is not out for money, I only brought this up because you mentioned that the Vets wanted the shots to mandatory because it would hurt their pocketbooks.

I do want to thank you Kim for letting us all know about this issue. I will definately look into it further. I will also say that I did not think that your initial post was rude or controversial however I have not read any of your other posts on this issue. What I gather is that it is not just this thread that is causing people to be upset but rather all of the threads collectively. I do get the feeling that you want us to stop vaccinating our animals, to see the possible problems with it and stop. I do not think that you have out right said this though. In the end you will have informed me of a possible problem and caused me to educate myself on it. I will more than likely continue to vaccinate all of my animals.

Also one last thing, I think what the last choice implies is that before they were not taking an active role in the vaccination process, especially if they aren't doing anything different. I believe that it may have been nice had there been a choice of "continueing what was being done before" or something of that nature. I personally know that I would not like to choose the third one because of this and maybe others may feel the same way.

I appreciate your feedback and I guess I wasn't thinking when I made up the poll choices. I am not very good at polls. ....I have to admit. I was just trying to keep it simple. I was not intentionally trying to "rig it" which is what i feel some are implying.

It sounds like we would all love to have a vet like yours. I think I have finally found one similar to yours. You are luckier than you know to have him and he has obviously educated himself in the area of potential harm from over-vaccinating and is heeding the advice of the the vet school in this country who are now recommending vaccines every three yearsinstead of every year as was the previous schedule. This is defintitely a step in the right direction.

Maybe you could post a thread about the next conversation you have with him on this issue. I would be curious as to what he would say if you asked him for his opinion.

me too.... I meant I was agreeing with Vivette. :thumbup:

For what it's worth I tried to get admin to add more choices but he said it wasn't possible after the fact. Sorry. :(

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

I personally would NEVER not vaccinate Coco because from the moment I get home till the moment we go to sleep, we outdoors, at the park, at the store, ect. Every dog, child, person, animal she sees, she wants to say hi to. I wouldn't want to risk her catching anything and being that she's soo small, I don't think her little body could fight it. The shots we disperse over the course of 3 weeks. Her vet recommended we do that and she's never had any bad reactions. She adores her vet and all the animals she gets to play with. I would be too paranoid to let her be outdoors without her vaccinations. I've made this decision for my baby girl based on the fact that for decades upon decades professionals in that field have concurrently agreed upon vaccinations. Now to have a handful of homeopathic doctors try to shoot the other doctors work and for ME personally to take their advice would be absurd. I would rather go with what is logical to me and that is: WHAT HAS BEEN STUDIED AND HAS WORKED FOR YEARS WILL WORK FOR ME IF IT KEEPS HER SAFE.

I am sure that you have made the right decisions for Coco and she will be healthy her whole life and not have any negative health issues as a result of her vaccines. I respect your choices.

Just to correct you on one thing you said however,..... it is not a "handful of homeopathic vets" who are bringing this to light...there was actually a decision made recently by ALL of the veterinary schools in this country to change the vaccination schedule protocol from the previously accepted annual schedule to every three years as a sort of compromise, but most agree that every dog should be treated on an individual basis based on his/her needs, his/her immunity levels after testing, etc, because there is no "one size fits all" when it comes to vaccines.

Not all vets have switched and some still stay on the annual schedule and it is simply not necessary. Over vacciantion will have consequences for future generations of dogs even if not for yours.

Kim, I can understand it being upsetting to you that someone would threaten to put your non rabies vaccinated dog down if it bit someone but I don't know if you are aware that there is no "test" for rabies...at least not on live animals. Not to be graphic but the way you "test" for rabies is to cut the head of the suspected animal off and send it to have the brain tissue tested.

BLAH!!!! I just ate, too! just kidding...I knew that about rabies!

Isn't that great apre meal conversation?? ( I just had dinner too!!)

They do not do that if a dog bites someone however. They simply quarantine it and wait the necessary period of time for any rabies symptoms to appear. In fact all biters are quarantined whether there is proof of rabies vaccine or not because the vaccine doesn't always work. The quarNTINE IS IN YOUR HOME.

You were not actually trying to scare people here into thinking that might happen to their dog if they don't get the rabies vaccine were you? If so .....that is absolutely false!

hehehe! :D

Maybe in Cali but here, they are taken to a facility run by the county or vets to be watched.

Do you have a citation for that ordinance so I can read the language?

No, Kim, I don't. I did however work at a humane society where they had a place that kept the dogs that had bit people...kept them for 7 days...so i'm speaking from experience.

we also had a place to keep cats that bit people, too. geesh!

here if you want something to read!!!!!

http://www.tdh.state.tx.us/ZOONOSIS/animcont/ACO%20Manual/LEG82603.pdf#search='texas%20dog%20quarantine%20la ws'

can't get the link to work...i'll e-mail the pdf to you

just e-mailed it to you

Thank you Kimberley. I read it.

There are the facilities you described but they are not the first option.

It states that an animal that bit someone may be quarantined at home if it can be kept in a confined area, it can be checked by a vet on the first and last day of the quarantine period, it was not a stay when it bit, and definitley if it is under 4 months of age and hasn't had a rabies vaccine. The other option is to have it quarantined at the vet's office. These are all first options before the animal would be quarantined in a state facility.

So, while it is possible, it is the third and last alternative for quarantine and most occur in the home or the vets office, especially when it involves a small dog like a yorkie who is easily confined.

my dad got bit by an akle biter years ago when he went to use a phone to report a house fire. Animal control came and picked up the dog and kept it for 7 days. could be that it's different in different counties.

same way here. only if its a serious bite. a lot of places do that. i think its a great idea.

i wanted to add, kim, that everything isn't the same as it is in california. :cool:

Of course not Megan.

Most of the statistics and laws I cite I explain whether it is a state law, a federal law or a local county or city ordinance and which laws take precedence over others. For example. the service dog law is a federal law so it takes precedence and controls over any state or local law or ordinance. Even the county law says "no dogs allowed" it isn't the controlling law becuase the federal law overrides it.

For example, Texas only requires a rabies vaccine every three years while all but two other states that require a rabies vaccine require them annually. So the question is, if texas knows the vaccine is good for three years, why do other states stay with the one year schedule and the answet is that the veterinarian and drug company lobbies are stronger in other states...in other words it's poilitcal and tied to people's pocketbooks and usually wealthy people.

It use to be annually here but I'm thinking 1-2 years ago, they changed it to every 3. The dog received 2 rabies shots a year apart then it's every 3 years after that.

Thanks for this important thread
 

First, thanks for discussing this. I'm too tired to get into all of the research I've done and the issues I think are involved, but it is important to know that all of these questions are being researched, and there are new protocols being devised constantly.

We show our dogs and they are exposed to other dogs who travel and I consider their risk very high. It may also be that because most show dogs are vaccinated against everything on an accelerated schedule that they shed some protection to the unvaccinated.

I think Kim's point that this is something that each dog owner needs to research and discuss with his/her vet is the main objective and the most valuable. I talked with my vet and he says that even though research indicates that far fewer vaccinations are required than previously thought, most of his clients are not comfortable with that and opt for the 6-8-10 week puppy combos and annual vaccinations. This works most of the time, but we have found a particular sensitivity in our Yorkies to leptosporosis, for instance, and we don't vaccinate for it - even the show dogs. It's a risk, but as time passes, I am more and more comfortable. You need to assess your own dog's immune system, your region of the country, diseases prevalent in your area, your dog's age (we don't give anything but rabies that's required by law after 7 years of age) and your own comfort level. I think one of the most important safeguards, though, is to keep your young puppies away from possible exposure until 3-4 weeks after their last distemper/parvo series.

Thanks again for this important discussion.

CJ

Thanks CJ for your insights from a showbreeder's perspective. :thumbup: