This article was in the New York Times on June 17, 2003 and was written by Denise Grady and Lawrence K. Altman, the article can be accessed at http://nytimes.com/2003/o6/17/science/beyond-cute-exotic-pets-come-bearing-exotic-germs.html. A quote from that helps summarize the entire article is, " Dr. Olsterholm, who is director for the Center of Infectious Disease Research and Policy and a professor of public health at the University of Minnesota, said that until recently, his main objection to prairie dogs was that they and their fleas sometimes carried the bubonic plague. He had not even thought about monkeypox..." In this article it talks about how the United States has exported thousands of Prairie Dogs as household pets to places such as Japan and the European Union, this was before the realization that these "pets" carry wild diseases such as the bubonic plague and monkeypox. The monkeypox in humans is equivalent to a milder case of smallpox with only at 10% death rate.
This article was very interesting because I never even knew that the United States exported prairie dogs as household pets to other nations, I find it very bizarre actually. Why anyone would want a prairie dog is beyond me. Also, I had also forgotten that these wild animals would carry abnormal diseases because they do not typically live with humans. This article reminded me of the H1N1 unit we did in class and how a "pig" virus was infecting humans because in both cases the disease was coming from an animal. There appears to be no tension in the article except for when the other talks about how Dr. Olsterholm gets the chills thinking about prairie dogs being shipped to other countries and spreading their germs. Overall, this article was a very intersting read.
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I agree with Erin, I found this article to be very interesting. When I think of people having exotic animals as pets I never thought about how these animals can spread disease. This article describes diseases such as the swine flu. The diseases originate in animals and are spread to humans because of their close living conditions with each other. I wonder if zoo keepers are often infected by such diseases. As Erin said, I do not know why anyone would want to keep prairie dogs as house pets, but then I also ask why would anyone want a ferocious tiger as a pet?
ReplyDeleteWhen I first thought of prairie dogs as being pets in the United States I laughed. I thought that there is no way people in the U.S have prairie dogs as pets. Nevertheless people in this country never cease to amaze me. That is crazy, expesically with this information about how they carry such deadly diseases. I hope that people with stop having exotic animals as pets. It is just wrong. Wild animals should be in the wild not in someone's house. This article reminds me that some people in this great country of ours are crazy. Tigers, alligators, prairie dogs, and other pets like pythons should not be pets, plain and simple. Thanks for this interesting article, and for reminding me of the crazy peoplet that live in America.
ReplyDeleteI found this article very interesting, but also very troubling. I did not know that the U.S. exported prairie dogs to other countries, as pets. Being one of the most advanced nations, scientifically and medically, it is almost bizarre that the U.S. would export disease-carrying animal knowing the risks. Having been through many epidemics, I am surprised that the U.S. is exporting animals as domesticated pets that will live with humans, and potentially pass on deadly diseases. If the prairie dog were a carrier of the bubonic plague from infected fleas, this would cause massive devastation and death on a global scale because of advanced transportation systems. I think the U.S. and anyone willing to buy a potential infected prairie dog is very ignorant and selfish, because there could be serious and deadly risks!
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