More than half of U.S. dog owners expressed concerns about vaccinating their dogs, including against rabies, according to a new study published Saturday in the journal Vaccine. The study comes as anti-vaccine sentiments among humans have exploded in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Pets are now often considered to be a member of the family, and their health-care decisions are weighed with the same gravity. But the consequences of not vaccinating animals can be just as dire as humans. Dogs, for example, are responsible for 99% of rabies cases globally. Rabies, which is often transmitted via a bite, is almost always fatal for animals and people once clinical signs appear. A drop in rabies vaccination could constitute a serious public health threat.
In the new study, the authors surveyed 2,200 people and found 53% had some concern about the safety, efficacy or necessity of canine vaccines. Nearly 40% were concerned that vaccines could cause dogs to develop autism, a theory without any scientific merit.
The article does not link the study. It can be found linked from the authors site (https://www.mattmotta.com/publications) here: https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/qmbkv/
Honestly, it’s more worth reading than the article. It’s 7 pages, not including references and data.
I was wondering who the 2,200 people were. From the study:
Can you please start educating your country
someone has to make the loud ones sit down and shut up first
My country? I’m Canadian.
Granted, we’re ten years behind the US at most.
You can’t make someone learn when they’re determined to remain ignorant. So no.
Problem is our country tells each of our 50 states to do the education thing… so that leads to a huge range of outcomes for the unlucky students born into the wrong state.