Rabies Outbreak in Taidong - Formosahut forum

"Late the previous day, a masked palm civet was found attacking a pet dog in a household in Donghe Township."

Actually there have been cases reported across the island but Taidong seems to be a hotspot. If it gets into the free-range dog population here, which would seem highly probable, then it's gonna be like being a zombie movie every time you walk down the street in Dulan.
http://focustaiwan.tw/news/asoc/201307250024.aspx

I had an image for a B-rated horror movie of crazed ferrets and civets coming out of the woodwork and attacking people. We went to the Dulan library yesterday to get our animals vaccinated. We got there before 9am thinking we'd beat the crowd. Man, what a zoo, literally. There had to be hundreds of animals, all making noise, totally disorganized situation. Given that the govt. knew that rabies was back a year ago and didn't tell anybody, the situation yesterday was entirely avoidable.

Hahaha. Sounds like a great movie. Brian has just gone camping - he could be in it.

That's good to know at least that there is a vaccination plan and that people are using it - even if it is shambolic. Though there's still the problem with all the dogs roaming the streets. Do you have any idea how an outbreak arises? Is rabies always out there latently? Why does it suddenly flare up? Where does it start from?

Seems that it always exists in the animal population in some form, but can't discover why it flares up.
In Asia and in parts of the Americas and Africa, dogs remain the principal host. In 2010, an estimated 26,000 people died from rabies.[54] The majority of the deaths occurred in Asia and Africa.[3] India has the highest rate of human rabies in the world, primarily because of stray dogs,[55] whose number has greatly increased since a 2001 law forbade the killing of dogs.

But sounds serious. Apparently it is fatal to humans in almost 100% of cases if not treated before symptoms manifest.

There is a report in today's Chinese press that shrews in Taitung are now carrying it. That's bad. Our yard is full of those little buggers and our pets are constantly playing with them and eating their brains. Apparently, a shrew ran into a house in Taitung County and started gnawing on a woman.

There was another report of a dog attacking its owner for no reason in Beinan.

I read somewhere that this rabies virus is almost identical to the strain found in southern China, so people are speculating that an illegally imported infected animal got lose. I just realized you don't have rabies in Australia. I have always been a rabiesphobe (I looked it up: Hydrophobophobia, http://common-phobias.com/Hydrophobo/index.htm) The US has always had rabies and people die of it every year in spite of decades of efforts to get rid of it. In the US, bats are one of the main causes of rabies, as are skunks.

Here is a very good site I found: http://nwco.net/044-WildlifeDiseases/4-1-0-Rabies.asp. It has a 'Next page' link at the bottom of every page. Interesting stuff. Just the facts.

I think somewhere on that site they say only two people die a year of rabies in the US, but it seems like every time I'm back somebody is dying of it. The last time I was back, a guy stepped on a bat in his attic and got it. One good bit of information is that if you see any bat on the ground, you have to assume it has rabies.

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