In some way it would be great to wrap our pets in cotton wool to stop them getting hurt or sick. In my experience, there a few animal that this would be more difficult do with than a cat. Since bundling them up (not to mention herding them away from danger) is not really practical, we have to rely on other disease prevention strategies and the cornerstone of these is vaccination.
Vaccination is at the heart of disease prevention in dogs. We at CAVH recommend for most dogs, that they receive a C5 vaccination, to best protect them from preventable diseases in our area. While most people are aware of the Parvo component of our vaccinations, many people don't know what other diseases their dogs are covered for.
The 5 in “C5” refers to the 5 different components of the vaccine, each one covering for a different cause of disease.
Rabbit Calicivirus, also known as Rabbit Haemorrhagic Disease Virus (RHDV), is a viral disease first released in Australia in 1996, in an effort to control feral rabbits. There are a number of different strains in Australia. A new strain, RHDV1 K5, is to be released in the Illawarra and over 600 sites across Australia in early March. This timing corresponds with peak feral rabbit numbers.
The virus is spread by rabbit to rabbit contact, flies and fleas, as well as contaminated clothes and environment.
After about 40 years of dormancy there has recently been an outbreak in Sydney of Feline Parvovirus. This is also called Feline Enteritis (that's what it's called in most vaccines now) or panleukopaenia (that's what it used to be called in the vaccines).
There has been a spike in the number of cases of parvovirus in Dapto in recent times and this mainly because there is an increasing population of unprotected dogs. All of the cases we have seen have been adolescent dogs that did not receive their full course of vaccinations when they were young. Canine Parvovirus is a killer virus. Even with intensive treatment many dogs don’t survive.
