Take Advantage of the December Rabies Clinic

Although rabies is a disease that has affected mammals for centuries, a medical breakthrough changed the outcome of this epidemic in 1885 -when the first rabies vaccine was developed by two French scientists, Louis Pasteur and Émile Roux.

According to the CDC, these vaccines now save an estimated 16,000-39,000 potential human rabies victims a year in the United States, not including the inestimable amount of pets it saves a year.

So why is it important that our pets are vaccinated against rabies?

Rabies is a completely preventable disease spread by animals to other animals and humans- it is almost always fatal without treatment; and thanks to vaccination it is usually spread by wildlife in the United States as opposed to house pets, however, regardless of how it’s spread, out of the thousands of humans exposed to the threat, there are only three recorded cases in the entire world of someone surviving the illness without receiving a vaccine.

Two of the victims were 15, both bitten by a rabid bat, and the third victim was 8 and was scratched by a rabid feline. Two of the victims live in the United States, and all three of the victims were treated in the United States using the same procedure.

In 2004, the first of the three surviving victims received the newly proposed and never before performed treatment, now known as the Milwaukee Protocol.

The treatment consists of inducing the patient into a coma in order to shut down the virus’s area of attack, allowing the patient’s immune system a more opportune amount of time to fight the virus. Anti-viral drugs are also administered to aid the immune system.

There is still much stipulation surrounding the effectiveness of the Milwaukee Protocol, and although it has been linked to the survival of a few lucky souls, there have been dozens of less fortunate victims who had also received the treatment and did not survive. Not to mention, this procedure leaves a high risk of mentally incapacitating the victim.

Since it’s not always easy to tell if an animal is infected especially to an untrained eye, it’s no surprised that none of the surviving victims were aware that the animals they had come in contact with were rabid, thus delaying treatment and making rabies vaccines completely useless.

“Rabies has an incubation period of two weeks to three months and kills within a week of the symptoms showing up. The vaccine series and other immune therapies are useless at this point and may even speed up and increase the severity of the symptoms. Usually, patients are made as comfortable as possible in the hospital or, in countries without sophisticated health care, sent home to die an agonizing death,” this source explains.

It’s considerably cheaper to vaccinate a pet for $10 than to vaccinate a human for $1,200 per shot in a 3-4 shot dose (typically not covered by insurance), and it’s even cheaper to vaccinate yourself and your pet than to have the Milwaukee Protocol performed, as the treatment costs about $800,000 and the survival rate is extremely low.

Utilize the opportunity to take part in the upcoming rabies clinic (official flyer below):

Rabies Clinic hosted by Feline Friends of Ellwood City, Saturday, December 17^th 2016 from 10:00 A.M. – 2:00 P.M. at the Franklin Township Supervisors office, 897 State Route 288, Fombell, PA  16123.

Dogs should be on leashes and cats in the carrier

Cash only $10.00 Rabies Vaccination good for one year

Any questions, please call Karen at 724-601-6499

*walk-in clinic, no registration required*