Scary handling of a bad situation by CFIA

This has been happening to a friend of mine. She is so stressed about it! The SPCA is telling her there may even be a cruelty to animals charge against the federal government come out of it....

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Not sure which video you are referring to. I get a whole list when I click the link.

What a horrible situation and a sad loss for the family!

uno wrote:Not sure which video you are referring to. I get a whole list when I click the link.

Hmm, I get a list to the right, but the video to the left. It is the CTV Suspected Rabies Case one.

Is this woman a friend of yours?

Then forgive me for what I'm about to say, but it sounds like she is horribly under-equipped to be bringing home strays, if she has never heard of rabies! This is Canada! We have wild animals. We have rabies! You have got to live in a bubble if you live in this country and don't know about rabies.

When Horse Daughter brought home that half dead, straggly cat I was indeed concerned about rabies. I had my eye peeled for the first sign of neurological malfunction and that cat would have been hit on the head with a shovel and hauled in to the vet's for a RABIES test. Does that sound harsh? Rabies will kill you. 100%. Guaranteed. Dead. It is NOT something to fool around with and if you bring unknown animals into your home without knowing about rabies, you are a fool.

It sounds like this lady was not able to get help. BUt it also sounds like she did not utter the word 'rabies'. By her own admission, she didn't know about it. She has her own cats and doesn't know about rabies? HELLO!?! I suspect that had she phoned the vet and said, "we have a cat here that is showing classic symptoms of rabies, what is the protocol in this situation", she might have received attention. But she didn't say that. It would have been easy to treat her as just another lady with another sick cat. No biggy.

When I thought we had been exposed to a rabid bat, I phoned the poison control centre and told the man I think we had been exposed to a rabid bat, and how easily is rabies transmitted? He said, DO NOT MOVE FROM YOUR PHONE! Someone will call you in 20 minutes, and they did. After being thoroughly questioned, we had an answer. But they wanted to examine the bat's body, which we didn't have.

I know I sound hard hearted. But her family has been placed at serious risk because she has chosen to NOT EDUCATE HERSELF about the diseases one really needs to know about. I find that inexcusable. I would NEVER sit there and hope someone would come get the poor kitty. I'd be packing that thing in a bag and lugging it to the vet or RCMP. And then I'd get my family to an emergency room screaming RABIES at the top of my lungs! There is no excuse to not know.

Oh my. That is sad. I do agree partially with Heda though why not quarentine the cats until a necropsy was done on the dead cat? Oh, they probably disposed of the body...sad situation but not sure how it can be considered animal cruelty on the federal gov.

I am so sorry for their loss and stress, I hope they can move forward.

The cat was a stray that wandered into their yards three days previous, as happens often in their area.

She did call multiple vets, the SPCA and was finally directed to CFIA. She suspected rabies, and was told someone would be right out with a vet to get it. The family offered to pay the $500 vet charge for an after hours call ( it was 4:30) on a Friday when the calling started.

After a bit they got a call back from CFIA that they would not be coming out because they did not have a rabies pole and to quarantine it in their garage until it died, put it on ice and call back. It died that night, so they did as told. No one came. They kept changing the ice in the cooler all weekend and when they got home from work Monday and called again they were told it was " too late to test" ( I can see that, but CFIA did say they would come get the cat.)

So, the original sick cat was never tested because the CFIA guy told them later that he would not get paid overtime to come on the weekend to get it.

They family was served with a seizure warrant Friday night at 9 and a whole load of people showed up Saturday night at 9:30 to take the remaining cats.

Sounds like they didn't mind paying the overtime on Saturday to all those people who had co come out to take the remaining healthy cats.

This is one giant clustermuck on the part of the officials. So very preventable. If this had happened to us and our kitties, Doug would have been devastated.

Let me guess, the family had to have their cats put down because they could not afford the 6 month quarantine fees to see if the cats actually had rabies.

Yes, Sue, it would have been $9 per day per cat for six months to have them quarantined at the animal shelter. Or they could build individual double walled cages at their house and keep them there, but had 48 hours to do it in.

It's a circus to be sure...

DCChick wrote:Yes, Sue, it would have been $9 per day per cat for six months to have them quarantined at the animal shelter. Or they could build individual double walled cages at their house and keep them there, but had 48 hours to do it in.

It's a circus to be sure...

Darn, I could have loaned them some wire crates. I imagine by that point it was very hard to think straight or make a decision.

$9 per day per cat at 9 cats is $81 a day. (Was it 9 cats including kittens? The video will not play here) 6 months is 180 days. $81 x 180= $14580 to quarantine the cats.

Yes, that's the quarantine cost.

Very SAD for everyone concerned but Rabies is nothing to fool around with. I would like to point out that if her cats had been up to date on their rabies vaccinations they would not have been seized and euthanized. By the look of the kittens they may have been too young for vaccines but the adult cats could have been saved. In Canada, if a pet (dog or cat.... not sure about other species) is not vaccinated for rabies and bites someone it is an automatic death sentence IF the person that has been bitten requests it! The animal must be euthanized and submitted for testing. How do I know this? Recent personal experience. I was bitten by an un-vaccinated dog and both the dog's own vet and the people Dr. I went to asked if I wanted to have that happen. As the "victim" I was within my rights to demand that someone's beloved family member be killed , decapitated and submitted for testing. Of course I didn't but had I been that type of person I could have. For the health and safety of your family please consider at least keeping the rabies vaccinations current. It could save lives!

That horrible to be told to handle it a certain way, follow instructions and have it thrown back at you! Not good at all!!!! Maybe next time the cat should wait til Monday to get sick or die!

bcboy. Thanks for the video. Great for basic explaination but I think it is very outdated:) No gloved in the lab...wow things have changed. Just teasing:)

An update, if anyone wants to see it.

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