Now those of you dog owners who pay attention know that parvo outbreaks happen not infrequently, and unless it’s local to you most of us don’t pay a lot of attention any more. As long as your dog is vaccinated you’re not likely to have problems.
Unfortunately this outbreak in AZ might be different.
At least one veterinarian is reporting that they’re seeing VACCINATED dogs sick with parvo.
Now before everyone completely panics, the dog in the picture is being held by a rescue, and so it’s entirely possible that this dog had only been vaccinated shortly before actually getting sick (many rescues vaccinate on intake since they don’t know the dog’s history prior). Which means that the vaccine wouldn’t have had time to convince the immune system how to work. However there’s no way to be sure from the posted information. And they’re saying that they’ve seen multiple vaccinated dogs sick.
If you’re in the AZ area, or traveling through the AZ area, please take extra precautions. Even if you’re not a dog owner, if you have friends or family who do have dogs consider taking a minute to dip the soles of your shoes in bleach water. Parvo is a nasty disease with a high fatality rate.
Oh, and if your dog has diarrhea don’t take him to the dog park. Just…..don’t.
I’m pretty sure several years ago, in this area, we had the same thing; vaccinated dogs were getting sick. Looked it up and the 2c strain, a more aggressive strain, was going around in ’06.
It wouldn’t surprise me, unfortunetly. If it spreads though it could be really bad