Safe Family: Rabies
Save Email Print
Bookmark and Share
Posted: 2:06 PM Sep 30, 2008
Safe Family: Rabies
In today’s Safe Family report, Josh Stevenson looks at what you can do to protect yourself, your family, and your pets, against rabies.
Reporter: Josh Stevenson
Email Address: josh.stevenson@kxii.com
width:200 and height: 120 and picwidth: 200 and pciheight: 120
Font Size:

In today’s Safe Family report, Josh Stevenson looks at what you can do to protect yourself, your family, and your pets, against rabies.

By definition, the word “rabies” means madness, rage, or fury. It is also know as hydrophobia.

Rabies can be a serious health threat to your pet.

Dr. David Tidwell at Texoma Veterinary Hospital says, "Rabies is a virus that causes neurological disease and is nearly always fatal."

Rabies is spread by the saliva of an infected animal, usually through a bite.

"The most common transmitter in our area is definitely going to be skunks," Dr. Tidwell says.

You can limit your pet’s exposure to skunks and other potential carriers of this deadly disease by putting up a fence and making sure there are not any readily available sources of food, like left-out dog food or open trash cans, and by making sure your pet is up to date on all its shots.

"The way to protect our pets is to get them vaccinated and make sure those vaccines are kept current," Dr. Tidwell says.

But rabies is not just a danger for your pets- people can also be at risk.

"Try to limit exposure to wild animals where we don’t know their vaccine status."

If you do not know the animal, you do not know if it has been vaccinated or whether or not it has rabies. Any dog can be dangerous.

"If you’re getting a stray off the side of the road, a lot of times that animal will bite even if it’s not vicious, just out of being hurt for protection."

For more on how you can protect yourself and your pet against rabies, check:

http://www.cdc.gov/RABIES/

http://www.healthscout.com/ency/68/738/main.html

This Safe Family report is brought to you by:




KXII Twitterfeed (@KXIITV)
    In The Community
    Trendy Tuesday: It's all about cupcakes

    Last Updated: 10:04 PM 02/07/12 - It's Trendy Tuesday and it's all about cupcakes. (Full Story)
    Severe storm program coming to Grayson Co.
    Last Updated: 3:11 PM 02/06/12 - DENISON, TX - As part of its area-wide weather preparedness campaign, the National Weather Service in Fort Worth will answer these and many other questions at the SKYWARN severe weather program on Thursday, February 16th, at the Grayson County College. (Full Story)
    Dot Foods to host job fair in Ardmore
    Last Updated: 3:12 PM 02/06/12 - ARDMORE, Okla. — Dot Foods will conduct a job fair Saturday, February 11, with hopes to fill 50 full- and part-time positions. The job fair will be held at the Ardmore distribution center located at 3411 Cypert Way in Ardmore, Okla. from 10:00 a.m. until 2:00 p.m. (Full Story)
    New Meals on Wheels Executive Director
    Last Updated: 6:24 PM 02/03/12 - SHERMAN, TX-- Meals on Wheels serves 36,000 meals to senior citizens in Fannin, Grayson and Cooke Counties in one month. And now they've got a new leader at the helm. (Full Story)
    Meeting to Address Medicare Concerns

    Last Updated: 8:37 AM 02/03/12 - There are two big meetings coming up for Texoma seniors and their families. (Full Story)
    More Headlines