Dogs Vaccines

[THE FUGITIVE]

THANKS TO PIOPAT ON OUR OTHER FORUM

UK dog owners are learning what US dog owners have suspected all along …

…the lepto vaccine is much more dangerous than we’re led to believe.

The Nobivac L4 lepto vaccine, which was rolled out in the UK by Merck’s UK subsidiary, MSD Animal Health, is reportedly causing adverse effects in the dogs receiving it, including epilepsy, swollen glands, blindness and death.

Reports say that since its introduction to the UK in 2014, over 2,000 reports of adverse reactions to Nobivac L4 have been received by the Veterinary Medicines Directorate, which regulates UK animal drugs.

The vaccine is also suspected in the deaths of at least 120 dogs.

The news is such a surprise to UK pet owners that even UK tabloids are carrying the reports.

Maybe the UK government will take this dangerous vaccine more seriously than the government here in the US … because, as you’ll see, nobody seems to be concerned about how dangerous this vaccine really is.
The UK Knew The Dangers Of the Lepto Vaccine

Safety concerns were raised about this vaccine back in 2014 when the L4 vaccine was introduced.

The 2014 European Medicines Agency Veterinary Pharmacovigilance Report investigated the Nobivac L4 vaccine and found:

“Several signals were identified, mainly relating to anaphylaxis and various immune-mediated conditions such as anaemia, thrombocyte-penia and arthritis. The MAH [manufacturer] was advised for the upcoming PSUR to compare the incidence of these adverse events with its other Leptospira product, which contains only two serovars. There are no conclusions yet related to potential causal relationship and regulatory action has not been considered necessary at this stage.”

So basically, they saw evidence of sudden death and autoimmune disease (think cancer, allergies and joint disease, to name a few), and didn’t really think action was necessary.

The UK’s Veterinary Medicines Directorate (VMD) also reviewed the safety of the vaccine and their 2014 Review of Adverse Events Report stated:

“…for the purposes of this report, we have classified core vaccines as those giving protection against any combination of distemper, parvovirus, adenovirus, parainfluenza and/or leptospirosis. We have done this, as in the UK dogs are almost invariably vaccinated against leptospirosis at the same time as the other diseases, which makes it very difficult to determine which vaccine component is responsible for the signs observed.”

In case you didn’t catch that, they decided to bury the adverse events from the L4 vaccine with the other core vaccines.

Despite the signs of safety issues, the RSPCA and World Small Animal Veterinary Association (WSAVA) still recommend pet owners give their dogs the lepto vaccine. The current WSAVA recommendations for the lepto vaccine are:

“…when these non-core vaccines are chosen for an individual dog (on the basis of national or regional knowledge about the prevalence and risks of leptospirosis) they should be given from 8 weeks of age in puppies, with a second dose 2 �" 4 weeks later and then an annual booster vaccine.”

So basically, vets can give the lepto vaccine when there’s sufficient risk. So the next question is, what is the risk of lepto in the UK?

Lepto: A Shot In The Dark

MSD defended the promotion of the L4 vaccine in the UK because of “outbreaks” across the country. But when they were asked for evidence of this claim, they admitted it wasn’t based on research, but on anecdotal reporting from vets.

According to Dogs Today writer Hwin-Yi Cohen, the only actual report MSD could provide was a 1991 survey of more than 500 unvaccinated strays in Edinburgh and Glasgow. The study shows that between 23.5% and 27.5% of the stray dogs had antibodies to Leptospirosis (meaning they were exposed to it, got better and moved on with their lives). It also means that 75% of the stray dogs weren’t exposed to lepto at all (assuming there wasn’t a large number of dogs who died from lepto, which is just a assumption since MSD didn’t have those numbers either).

So we only know how many dogs had antibodies to lepto, not how many dogs were actually sick from it.

MSD funded a 2014 project headed by Christopher Ball from the University of Liverpool. A questionnaire was sent out to veterinary practices in the UK for his thesis. Of the 472 questionnaires he sent out, only 89 were returned. Of these, by far the largest response came from vet practices which had seen no lepto cases in the previous twelve months. Only 13 practices reported a case within the last twelve months, of which only five had lepto confirmed by a laboratory test.

A further 29 practices reported having seen a case within the last 15 years. No practice in the study reported seeing two or more suspected (or confirmed) cases in the previous 12 months.

Here in the US, there are also no official statistics for the prevalence of lepto, only haphazard and anecdotal reporting. And as you’ll see, what reporting we do have in the US also shows lepto isn’t all that common.

But Merck and MSD continue to push the lepto vaccine, arguing that it doesn’t matter how prevalent lepto is �" because lepto can lead to a horrible death for dogs.

But how true is this?


What Really Happens When Dogs Get Lepto

Just like the stray dogs in the UK, healthy dogs who come in contact with lepto may never show any symptoms.

In affected dogs, symptoms can include fever, vomiting, diarrhea, muscle pain, blood in the urine, lack of appetite and lethargy. In more serious cases, jaundice�"a yellowing most easily seen in the whites of the eyes�"can occur as the kidneys are affected.

And in most cases, leptospirosis is highly treatable when recognized early. Conventional treatment with antibiotics (typically Doxycycline) usually gives fast, good results and homeopathy is also very successful in treating lepto.

There is a terrible peracute (very sudden) form of the disease where animals go into rapid shock and die; and that’s the lepto we’re all led to fear.

What Is Leptospirosis?
Leptospirosis is caused by the Leptospira bacteria, a type of motile bacteria called a spirochete. The bacteria occur in the urine of animals that have the disease. They survive in water such as streams, ponds and puddles, especially during warmer, rainy seasons. They are also more common in tropical climates where there’s likelihood of standing water or flooding. Rat infestations in densely populated urban areas can also be a factor.


Geography
In the US, leptospirosis is most common in Hawaii, California, Oregon, Washington, the upper Midwest, Texas, Colorado and the mid-Atlantic coastal region as well as the southeastern US.
How Lepto Is Transmitted
Dogs, farm animals and wild animals such as raccoons, skunks and rodents can all carry the bacteria.

A dog can become infected when he comes in contact with water contaminated with infected urine. The spirochetes enter the body through the mucous membranes of his mouth, eyes, or nose.

Humans can also contact leptospirosis through contact with the urine of an infected animal or drinking contaminated water. This is so rare (100 to 200 cases a year) that the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) doesn’t even consider it a reportable disease. There are 30 US states that do report human cases and Hawaii is where the disease is most prevalent in humans.

Leptospirosis Symptoms
Signs of leptospirosis infection are often vague and non-specific and may include:

    Fever
    Lethargy
    Muscle soreness
    Appetite loss
    Vomiting
    Diarrhea
    Jaundice

Leptospira organisms can cause severe damage to the liver and kidneys, so veterinarians should suspect leptospirosis in dogs with signs of kidney or liver failure. Other symptoms include uveitis, pulmonary hemorrhage, acute febrile illness or abortion.

Dogs suffering from the peracute form of the disease may show severe symptoms such as:

    Rapid breathing
    Rapid, irregular pulse
    Coughing up blood
    Tarry feces
    Nosebleed
    Red or purple spots on the skin (known as petechial hemorrhage)
    Reluctance to move
    Very sensitive to pain or touch
    Enlarged lymph nodes

Unfortunately the peracute form of the disease is very hard to treat, even with intensive care.
Many healthy dogs (and humans) exposed to Leptospira may not show any symptoms or become ill.


The Nobivac L4 Vaccine
The Nobivac L4 Vaccine is the most recent Leptospirosis vaccine that covers four different strains of Leptospira bacteria:

    interrogans serogroup Canicola serovar Canicola
    interrogans serogroup Icterohaemorrhagiae serovar Copenhageni
    interrogans serogroup Australis serovar Bratislava
    kirschneri serogroup Grippotyphosa serovar Bananal/Lianguang

The manufacturer recommends giving it at 9 weeks of age, followed by a second shot four weeks later.  Immunization lasts for one year.


But just how many cases of lepto are the low-grade, treatable form and how many dogs actually die?

Nobody is telling us that either and nobody is really keeping track on a large scale.

So I looked at one of the states where lepto is most commonly found �" California. And they claimed again that the cases of lepto have been rising in the past few years.

But after a little digging, I found that in 2014, only five dogs in all of Los Angeles County were actually confirmed to have lepto.

Five!

So let’s do the math. There are an estimated 1,131,392 households in Los Angeles county that own an average of 1.48 dogs. This means there are an estimated 1,674,460 dogs in Los Angeles County.


And out of those 1,674,460 dogs, only five showed signs of lepto.

Here are the cases of lepto in Los Angeles county for the last ten years.






So one out of every 334,892 dogs in an apparently endemic area tested positive for lepto antibodies in 2014.

Is this really an issue we should be concerned about?

(NOTE: Want to know exactly how many unnecessary vaccines your dog gets? grab our free Vaccine Guide and our handy chart will tell you instantly)
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http://get.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/vaccine/vaccinating-too-much-optin/?_ga=1.108336772.721335776.1469204333



We’re Afraid Of The Wrong Thing Here

So why are so many people trying to make dog owners vaccinate against lepto?

Well, check out this website called Lepto Info.
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http://www.leptoinfo.com/clinics_veterinarians/lepto_articles/articleTwo2.html


The headlines are very compelling and are clearly meant to scare dog owners into vaccinating for lepto.

read more of the above article here

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http://www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/report-lepto-vaccine-uk-dogs-dying/

THANKS TO FUGITIVE FOR BELOW

Sorry ive just noticed this post --in 2014 we got our staffy cody his yearly vaccine and straight away he took ill he had serious diareaha i know ive spelled that wrong but he had the sh*ts bad and was off his food and was even refusing to go for a walk well we have him insured and contacted the vet trouble is with insurances for pets you pay the first £90 then the insurance pays the rest so the vet done tests and xrays (to bump the price up so she could get more) then when they could not find the cause which THEY HAD CAUSED WITH THE INJECTION they charged us £460 --WE NURSED CODY OURSELVES BACK TO HEALTH WITH KALINE AVAILABLE FROM CHEMISTS FOR ABOUT £2 A BOTTLE AND ANTI HISTAMINE TABLETS ABOUT £3 A BOX we claimed or should i say the vet claimed the bill apart from the first £90
Last year we went to a different vet for his booster but explained what had occured they instantly said they dont use that type of vaccine but to be on the safe side give him anti histamines for one week before his injection and he was fine with that no bad signs like before
This year ive not bothered getting his booster reason is he is seven now and will have built up all the immunity he needs and im not risking killing my dog its that simple

Another warning about dogs PLEASE BE AWARE THIS WINTER ROAD SALT CONTAINS ANTI FREEZE AND KILLS DOGS IT GETS ON DOGS PAWS IT TASTES SWEET TO DOGS AND THEY LICK IT OFF AND DIE please be carefull

Never feed a dog kebab i know someone who gave there dog kebab meat and the salt killed there dog a dogs liver cannot get rid of salt the way ours can ALWAYS BE CAREFULL