Fundies and Pet Vaccinations

[Boogalou]

First of all, I would like to apologize if this opens up another vaccination debate, but I really cannot help myself.

A while ago a certain even got me thinking about fundies and vaccinations for their pets. A well known (here) anti-vaxer got a new pet and all I could think about is will they get that pet vaccinated or not. I considered asking but I couldn't bring myself to do it. First of all, I was hoping that either the pet was already vaccinated and it wouldn't matter or that they hadn't thought the thing through and were going to get it vaccinated anyway. Typing this out, I realize neither of these scenarios are very likely and I should have just asked but for some reason I couldn't bring myself to do it.

Anyway, does anyone know what fundies or, really, anti-vaxers in general think about pet vaccinations? Are there any laws out there that you have to get pets vaccinated? Just kind of curious where and how far the thought process goes.

[Guest Anonymous]

Anyway, does anyone know what fundies or, really, anti-vaxers in general think about pet vaccinations? Are there any laws out there that you have to get pets vaccinated? Just kind of curious where and how far the thought process goes.

In my state rabies vaccinations are mandatory, others are not.

[VintageJen1984]

I don't know if fundies have special reasons for not vaccinating or if being an anti-vaxxer for the ordinary reasons is just something a lot of fundies happen to do (a la crunchy).

As an anti-vaxxer, (yes, I know your herd immunity is protecting me. No, I'm not trying to get anyone else to live this way) I would not do it to my dog for the same reason I wouldn't do it to my kid. Vaccines have had devastating effects on people. Putting a bunch of synthetic chemicals in your body can have unintended consequences. I am not entirely opposed to Western medicine, but I also do not trust in it completely. There are tens of thousands of lawsuits out there against Big Pharma. And I will admit to being biased because I know someone personally who is 30 and has the mental capacity of an 18 month old and is wheelchair bound due to a reaction to a vaccine they received.

I am not putting this unpopular opinion out there to get into a debate on this, because I am not trying to make anyone else do it, it's just my personal view. I think you should take all the medicine you want, if you want to. I did not come to my decision about vaccines without reading and researching and forming my ideas, and I rather doubt a pro-vaxxer just does it without thinking it through, either. I just wanted to share my side, since you asked.

[breaker]

Anyway, does anyone know what fundies or, really, anti-vaxers in general think about pet vaccinations? Are there any laws out there that you have to get pets vaccinated? Just kind of curious where and how far the thought process goes.

I don't know about fundies, but I belong to a pet forum which sometimes has anti-vax threads (vets are just out to make money off your yearly booster shots, it's better to boost your pet's immune system naturally through diet and exercise, that sort of thing). There are people who advocate blood tests for pets to prove their antibody titer is high enough to avoid mandatory vaccinations (some vaccinations are required for boarding kennels and so forth). So there are a lot of parallels between the human and animal anti-vax crowd.

[formergothardite]

:shock: I had no idea that there were people who were against vaxing their pets. Rabies is nothing to mess around with and IMO if you aren't going to at least do that one, you should just stick with a fish.

[notsocommon]

:shock: I had no idea that there were people who were against vaxing their pets. Rabies is nothing to mess around with and IMO if you aren't going to at least do that one, you should just stick with a fish.

This....and non pet vaxers don't have a clue the lawsuits that can rain down on them in their non vaxed pet bites a person/ other pet.

[formergothardite]

VinateJen would you really not even get your dog the rabies vaccine? Do you have any pets right now?

[Swamptribe]

We get our pets vaxed. I recently attended a clinic and had both our both our dog and cat vaccinated and licensed for our county (not all areas require a license) What got me was nobody else was there with their cats, just dogs. And ours is an inside cat. I've met many people who don't feel they have to get their inside cat vaccinated.

Now, a few years ago this very same cat caught a bat that had flown into our house. Luckily it turned out not to have rabies. If it had, she would have needed one shot, but I (since I took the dead bat away from her) would have needed a series of painful and expensive vaccinations. If she had not been vaccinated, then she would have been destroyed. If I had not had the bat checked for rabies, and it had been infected, my whole family could have gotten sick.

Keeping a healthy immune system, while all well and good, does shit to protect your pets, and your family, from rabies.

[NurseNell]

I suppose it could depend on whether your pets are inside or outside. My cats are all inside cats only but I still have them immunized. If I had only one I probably wouldn't. When I get a dog I'll have him/her immunized since even an inside dog has to be walked. Rabies immunization is mandatory but I'd get the others too. Hoping to move in a year or so specifically so I can have a dog, probably a golden retriever or maybe golden/bichon frise.

[Curious]

I am not anti-vax for children. I AM anti-OVER vax for pets.

My dogs get their puppy set of shots (a course of 3 shots), which I am selective about. Then I give a booster between 12-15 months. After that, I titer them yearly for a couple years and then I start titering every 3 years.

I generally follow Jean Dodds recommendations: http://www.weim.net/emberweims/Vaccine.html I wait a little longer on boosters than she recommends depending on the dog.

In all my years of doing this protocol, I have NEVER had a dog come back with a low titer on anything that they were properly vaccinated against as a puppy with a 15 month booster.

I give rabies every 3 years, as required by law.

There is a lot of information about over vaxing pets available. It can cause auto-immune disease and cancer at the vaccine sites, just to name 2 problems. There is a lot of research that proves that there is no reason to routinely vaccinate dogs every year.

If you have an immune response there is no reason to give another vaccine, you don't get more immunity from more vaccines. That is why I titer initially. If my dog did not come back with the proper titer amounts, then I would revax that dog for whatever immunity (s)he was low on.

There is currently a push to have the major vet school adopt a new protocol that calls for vaccinations every 3 years vs every year due to research showing no need for yearly vaccination. Apparently, this has been adopted. When I was looking for links I found this: http://rolinridgebelgians.webnode.com/n ... e-protoco/

Here is an article by Dr. Dodd's that explains about vaccines: http://www.itsfortheanimals.com/DODDS-C ... TOCOLS.HTM (you have to scroll down a bit on the page to get to the article)

Dr. Dodd's also has a cat protocol as well, but I didn't look up that information to find a link. I don't vaccinate my cats past kitten shots/booster because they are strictly indoors. I don't titer them either since they have pretty much zero chance of exposure being indoor only.

Edit to add that I do get rabies shots for my cats every 3 years as well. That was maybe unclear in my original post.

[formergothardite]

I understand not getting all the numerous animal vaxes, but I still believe the rabies one shouldn't be optional, even if it is an indoor pet.

[Curious]

I was editing my post when you were posting. After I re-read it, I noticed it looked like I was saying I don't get rabies shots for my cats.

[Grace]

We vax our pets. I hadn't had the kitty updated since she got her kitten shots because I was concerned about over-vaxxing and knew someone who's cat almost died from a reaction to a booster so I wanted to do some more research into what was necessary since she is an inside kitty and not roaming outside.

Then we got our new puppy and took them both in for shots/checkups. I really expected the vet to be pushing 9 kinds of shots onto us but they were FANTASTIC and actually only recommended a few shots for the cat. Rabies of, course. But, even though the city says you have to get that every year the vet said they only recommend it every 3 years and they'd just give us a new tag next year and they'll just give her a physical next year so they can check her out and palpate her belly and whatnot to make sure she doesn't have anything going on that we didn't notice. I don't remember what all they gave to the kitty but, since we only have one and don't plan on getting more and she's older and healthy there were a couple they said she didn't need. We did do the heartworm for her only because we have the puppy who has to go outside and come back in and could bring it to her. Apparently heart worms are really hard to diagnose in cats and are often found way too late.

The puppy gets all the regular stuff. She has one more set of shots to get and she'll be done with the vet until it's time for her to get spayed.

[Guest Anonymous]

I worked at a veterinary teaching college for over a decade. We routinely refused admission for nonvaxxed pets and food animals.

I've been on a couple of goat forums and there are lots of anti vax voices in that community, back to the land fundys mostly, who refused tetnus for their goats, regardless of herd losses they had experienced.

[ChunkyBarbie]

This....and non pet vaxers don't have a clue the lawsuits that can rain down on them in their non vaxed pet bites a person/ other pet.

This and This

Having a pet is a responsibility. You are responsible for the pet's wellbeing and for the wellbeing of others around your pet, ie. biting, rabies, etc. If you are not going to take that responsiblilty seriously, you have no business being a pet owner. Get a chia pet or a virtual pet.

Don't get me started about people who feed their animals bad quality food and won't take the animals to the vet when needed. If you can't afford it, don't have a pet. If your financial circumstances have changed, many vets will work out a payment plan with you. Stopping further ranting.

Edited for rage riffles/ :oops:

[leena_noor]

We have our cats vaccinated when they are kittens (it's required) and then frankly...never again. They live with us, never go outside and are never exposed to other pets. There really is no way for them to get communicable diseases. That said, we take excellent care of our pets and are willing to drop big bucks on their health.

I think most fundies don't vaccinate b/c animals are expendable to them. They think people that love their animals are silly and you can replace a dog. It just seems to be the attitude I've seen.

[formergothardite]

We have our cats vaccinated when they are kittens (it's required) and then frankly...never again. They live with us, never go outside and are never exposed to other pets. There really is no way for them to get communicable diseases. That said, we take excellent care of our pets and are willing to drop big bucks on their health.

I think most fundies don't vaccinate b/c animals are expendable to them. They think people that love their animals are silly and you can replace a dog. It just seems to be the attitude I've seen.

Not even the rabies vaccine?

[hoipolloi]

Rabies is a terrible way to die, for humans or animals. Once the symptoms appear, the outcome is almost 100% fatal.

Various forms of the rabies virus are present in wild mammals that domesticated cats & dogs are likely to encounter in much of North America -- raccoons & skunks, for example. This map (http://img.medscape.com/fullsize/migrat ... l.fig2.gif) shows the general locations of what are known as "reservoir species" of mammals, in which rabies is ALWAYS present. While the overall rates of rabies have fallen greatly in the last half-century, it's worth noting that the recorded rate of infection in cats is much higher than in dogs, probably because cat owners often believe that their pets "need" to roam outside.

[Prek teach]

I get my cats vax for rabies each year, since some are indoor/outdoor. My dogs get the 3 yr rabies vax in accordance to the law. I want to not only protect my animals from rabies but giving them this vaccine also protects my family as well.

[Bookworm]

I know quite a few fundies who either have pet breeding "businesses" or who have cats giving birth regularly. Some fundies I know do appropriate vet care and others basically do nothing but set food and water out. The ones who take their pets to the vet when needed and spay/neuter etc. also tend to do music lessons and sports and have more normal lives for their children.

I live in a place that has a lot of animals abandoned from a nearby city as well as lots of rednecks, so I currently have one indoor cat and two outdoor ones who showed up and are basically feral. We trapped one and neutered/vaccinated him, and the other remains stubbornly beyond reach no matter what. He hangs around and gets fed but cannot be caught no matter what. It has been years but we do keep trying at intervals.

I always felt like many of the fundies I knew had a rather redneck attitude towards animals and to me it seriously undermined the whole quiverful thing. If you say God wants you to have many children, that is one thing, but if all your animals have babies willy-nilly and obviously suffer for it, I start to think you worship fertility more than anything else.

Rabies is mandatory here and we have our pets done when they see the vet for spaying/neutering and then as required after that. Otherwise, I give shots to the dogs and cats - it saves quite a bit of money that way and is not all that hard. After the initial shots I do space them out quite a bit and have never had any trouble with diseases yet.

[hoipolloi]

As a vet-going pet owner of 30+ years, I can say that vets have definitely changed their protocols for animal vaccinations & give them less frequently now. My animals have been fine, throughout, and it's good to know they're protected to the extent we can do so.

Might also add that our cats have only ever been indoor cats. When our vet pointed out that outdoor cats have an average lifespan of about a year while indoor cats live an average of seven years, we took the point.

[NurseNell]

Might also add that our cats have only ever been indoor cats. When our vet pointed out that outdoor cats have an average lifespan of about a year while indoor cats live an average of seven years, we took the point.

Only 7 years for an inside cat? I guess I thought it was older. My Siamese lived 22 years but she was an exception. My other cats have averaged 15 years. The cats I currently have are 8, 6, and 3 years old. All were immunized initially, then one cat needs a lion shave in the summer months so her immunizations are yearly. They all get current rabies immunizations, I have a balcony that they like to go out on. We live across from a forest preserve, and caves. We get bats and while I've never had one inside others have. Better safe than sorry.

[Katiebug]

Rabies vaccination is required here. Additionally we have a city ordinance requiring that dogs are registered annually, and you have to show proof of current rabies vaccination in order to register or renew a registration. There is rabid wildlife in our area and animal control doesn't mess around with rabies vaccination. I don't know ANY responsible pet owners in this part of the country who don't keep up with the rabies vaccine, and that includes the more granola/woo types who do titers on their pets for everything else.

Our vets have said that in recent years there's been a real trend in their field to reduce/minimize vaccinations (due to vaccine related sarcomas among other things). We do the 3 year rabies vaccine and while our dog is pretty much fully vaccinated, our now-deceased indoor cat didn't have a need for much in the way of vaccination besides her rabies shot for the last several years of her life. The vet didn't think it was necessary and we were glad to save a few bucks.

And the average lifespan of an indoor cat is more than 12 years, not only 7. The average outdoor or indoor/outdoor cat has a 4 year lifespan, so it's clearly in a cat's best interest to be indoors only if possible. Our cat was indoors only and lived a full and happy life. Meanwhile the people I know with indoor/outdoor cats tend to lose them to cars or coyotes within a few years - it was an easy choice for us to make to keep her inside. Our vet encourages indoor cats with rare exceptions (former ferals and the like).

[hoipolloi]

My vet's stats were from years ago; I'm sure things are better now. As it happened, our kitties lived to 15 & 19.

[Kaylee]

I have noticed a lot of people in my area don't vaccinate their dogs or get them proper (or any) vet care so I'm not sure that it's just a fundie thing. I do know of some knowledgeable pet owners and a few kennels that are anti-vaccine (Leerburg is one that just recommends withholding vaccines; Some kennels have it in their contracts that pets bred by them cannot be vaccinated), but I assume for most people it's just laziness and/or not wanting to spend the money on their pets.

I get full puppy shots (DAPPL) & KCV/Bordatella for my dogs, renewed each year and Rabies every 3 years. My cat has FVRCP & FELV with yearly boosters and rabies every 3 years. This is the schedule my vet recommends and covers the required shots for the boarding kennel I use. All my pets are inside, but I do take the dogs out for walks and to the dog park and let the dogs & cat play in the fenced part of the yard (not together), and I board them once or twice most years. When they're puppies, I do hang around near the vets for about 30 minutes after the shots to make sure they're doing OK.

AFAIK, there has not been as much research into pet vaccines as there has into human vaccines, and I don't know of any vet that will give the shot components separately like doctors can do with some childhood vaccinations. If I was as concerned about vaccine reactions with my pets as with my son, then I probably would space them out or be more selective, but right now there isn't a lot of data to go by and if it is an all or nothing thing then it makes more sense to vaccinate.