#hendravirus

[drferox]

I just got a text from the AVA confirming a case of Hendra in New South Wales near Scone, which is a major horse area and significantly further south than it’s been identified before.

Unvaccinated elderly Mare. Euthanised.

That’s distinctly not good.

[kilakituus]

5-Day Incredible Tanzania If you have 5 days available, this is the best tour that you can do. It allows you to visit the famous Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater but also either Lake Manyara or Tarangire NP, depending on the time of the year you will be visiting us. The whole experience provides fantastic photo opportunities. #hepatitis #hendravirus #hantavirus #groupbstrep #grippe #giardia #endmalaria #biomedicinaporamor #ebolawatch #ebolavirus #ebolaresearch #ebolaoutbreak #eboladrc #dengue #demodex #congestionnasal #colds #cholera #biomedicos #novovirus #carnaval #asvcp #cytology #microscopy #veterinarymedicine #vetmed #pathology #veterinaryclinicalpathology #clinicalpathology #clinpath (at Arusha, Tanzania) https://www.instagram.com/p/B903xn-HkaX/?igshid=1qq9hdemv6qt1

[cosmicmewtwo]

when the next pandemic starts all i ask is that i be dead within the first month

[pintofperegrine]

An illustration for my review of David Quammen’s Spillover!

Credits: Hendravirus - CSIRO

Altai Horses by Alexander Frolov

Ebola - CDC Public Health Image Library

Gorillas of Volcanoes National Park by mahorogeoffrey

Malaria Parasite - NIAID

Mosquitoes by F.V. Theobald, 1905

SARS-CoV-1 - NIAID

Horseshoe bats by Mike Prince

[tomthefanboy]

Saw a hendravirus post

I don’t want to detract from this very serious helath issue for our hooved companions.

HOWEVER....

In a list of informational bullt points these two were next to each other...

Transmits from horses to humans.

No cure in humans once symptoms present. Treated with prophylactic  monoclonal antibodies in humans (only effective in the first 48 hours), and survivors report long term symptoms.

and all my dumbass brain sees is 

and I’m like “Well if you’re going to fuck a a horse then OF COURSE you should be using a condom!”

but then, horribly, “Do they make condoms for horses though?”

[hendravirus-blog1]

My personal Channel check it out!

[ask-a-vetblr]

So I learned today that the Hendra virus is somewhat similar to the new Wuhan virus and now I'm having nightmares about the two somehow merging in Australia to create and person-to-person, fast spreading Hendra strain.

Prynhawn,

There’s a lot of fear and worry being generated by this novel coronavirus right now. The best way to combat that fear is to educate yourself to the best of your ability, using credible sources like the WHO and CDC.

undefined

Dr. Mike does a really good job explaining exactly how worried we should be, along with giving some updates on the progress of the virus. He stresses that we should be alert, and not anxious. 

The other think that he stresses towards the end of his video is that we shouldn’t let fear of this virus cause xenophobia towards Chinese people or people of Asian descent.

Until we have more information on the virus, it’s impossible to say whether or not is has the ability to mutate into/combine with something like Hendra, but there’s no evidence right now that suggests that we need to worry about something like that.

-mod @whalefromwales

[drferox]

I recently read an article on Hendra vaccine refusal among horse-owners in Australia. What's your personal take on that situation?

I’m hoping the article you read on Hendra virus and the anti-vaxxer situation we’re facing was this one by the Atlantic because it’s quite good.

My personal take is that horse owners that refuse to vaccinate their horses for Hendra virus value their horse and their ego over the lives of other human beings, veterinarians in particular. They will not be swayed by facts, and are organizing behind loud-mouth bullies to make equine practice in Hendra areas more dangerous than it already is, both physically and legally.

So, some quick and dirty facts about Hendra:

A virus naturally occurring in flying fox bats, which transmits to horses and is basically always lethal. Occasionally transmits from horses into humans, and has a greater than 50% mortality rate with intensive treatment and you’re not side effect free even if you do recover afterwards.

Hendra can present with any symptom, including but not limited to respiratory disease, colic and lameness.

If the horse has an unknown vaccination status, the veterinarian is obliged to wear full Personal Protective Equipment, and ensure anybody else going near that horse is also wearing it, every time. It looks like this:

(Image source)

It takes 1 to 4 days for a Hendra test result to come back.

Veterinarians have been prosecuted by the government for attending Hendra cases and leaving treatments for owners to administer. A vet can be prosecuted if the owner does something putting themselves at risk even if it’s against the vet’s advice, like approaching without PPE.

Here are some of the arguments presented by Hendra Anti-Vaxxers

The vaccine is untested. False. It had less testing than other vaccines before release because it was pushed through as an urgently required vaccine to save human lives, but data has continued to be gatheres.

It has a high rate of side effects. False. It’s had just under 1000 possible, not even proven, adverse effects from half a million doses, making it possibly even safer than the tetanus vaccine, and safer than procaine penicillin, which horse owners seem particularly keen to get over the counter without a prescription.

It’s my choice to vaccinate or not for my horse. I am “Pro-choice vaccine.”

Which is a fascinating point, because surely the vet can have a choice as to whether to treat unvaccinated horses too? I mean, we choose to put seatbelts on when we drive, and there’s no mandatory obligation to treat an animal if we reasonably believe we are at risk.

If they were really about ‘choice’ they’d understand veterinarians have a choice too. Some of them have closed their practices to move out of Hendra areas. Some have stopped seeing horses altogether. Some only see vaccinated horses, and a few choose to charge extra and approach an unvaccinated horse in full PPE, because that stuff isn’t cheap.

And the horse, the creature known for it’s flighty, explosive nature and pathological fear of plastic bags, is not always approachable when all the humans are dressed as plastic bags.

There is a lot of vet hating around the Hendra ‘debate’, which is really more of a ‘tantrum’. And why should vets risk their lives and livelihoods for people that refuse to vaccinate and so obviously hate them? I wouldn’t do it. If somebody is so stubborn about risking my life then I would walk away, even if their animals are suffering or dying. It’s my life. It’s my choice..

Now, most horse vets are more sympathetic to the plight of their equine patients than I am, and would be more likely to consider seeing unvaccinated horses if it was the owner that got sued in the event of a hendra case, not the vet. Because as it stands, the vet doesn’t get to make the choice, they only get the consequences.

If anti-vaxxers want the ‘choice’ about vaccination, then they need to be liable for the ‘consequences’. They can’t get all the choice and none of the consequences, because that simply isn’t fair.

And clearly not valuing the lives or welfare of veterinarians, especially equine vets who probably have it the hardest out of anybody, never sits well with me.

[drferox]

Climate Change & Vet Medicine

@pet-interests said: How does the good doctor see climate change as affecting future pets and pet care? Sometime last year, upon witness the rotties struggle at the beginning of summer weather, I decided to scratch those from my future list as it's only getting hotter. Lends me to wonder what else might change.

Well I don’t know about a good doctor, but this rather average doctor is staring at a pile of her long-neglected tropical medicine notes and lists of diseases she thought she’d never have to worry about again living where she lives and quietly muttering “Dammit.”

The climate is changing, this is not up for debate, and we are seeing changes. Native birds that shouldn’t live this far south are actually living and breeding this far south. Seasonal allergies once confined to a few months a year in any given patient are now flaring up all year round. The weather is getting hotter and the average new dog purchased by pet owners has a shorter and shorter face. (Okay, that one isn’t climate change but it is a problem)

Climate change has us all wary. For one there is the straight-up effects of the changed weather - pets not coping in the heat, potentially dying from heat stroke (especially the trendy brachycephalic dogs) and previously seasonal conditions are now showing up at any time of year. This is especially true with plant allergies as the growing season of those plants has changed, and they’re now blooming at any random time.

And as a secondary effect, disease ranges and vectors are moving. A vector is an organism which does not suffer from the disease, but transmits it from host to host. And when the vectors move their range, they bring the disease with them, because vulnerable dogs/cats/horses are everywhere. This is not helped by the widespread travel of animals for holidays and competitions.

So previous patterns that were well established for 30 or 40 years are just... not... any more.

We could probably handle most of it, but there’s a significant unknown factor at play, and Hendra is an example of that. With climate change comes emerging diseases as you mix species and pathogens that weren’t previously mixing together, and you can’t predict what those results will be. Who would have predicted that hendravirus in bats would be lethal to horses, and jump from horses to humans? Before we cleared the bat’s habitats and pushed them out over horse pastures, I don’t think anybody did.

The world is changing, and we will just have to adapt to it.

[drferox]

Hi Doc! Love reading your blog, I found you first through the Lucifer story (reminded me of a friend of mine actually) and then again through your mermaid post and have been hanging around ever since. I looked thru your archive but didn't find this question so hopefully it hasn't been asked before: what is it about horse anatomy that makes their legs so (seemingly) fragile? You'd think being as big as they are, they'd be more all-around solid. Thanks for reading, have a good one!

The horse, Equus caballus, is one of my favorite arguments against Intelligent Design. I’ve spoken before about why I no longer see them, but even as a student I would wonder why and how this species existed when there were apparently so many things that could go wrong with its own anatomy, especially next to something tough like a trusty cow.

I don’t know how it’s possible to believe in a benevolent, loving, wise creator when creatures like the horse come to exist.

So I’m going to use your question as an excuse to write a post that had been on my mind for a while:

Things That Are Wrong With Horses

The basic structure of a horse has a few significant design flaws.

Cannot vomit. This means that anything which would make another species sick enough to vomit results in a horse getting s distended stomach and colic, where the stomach can rupture and the horse can die. Also means symptoms of illness are hidden longer

The large bowel (hind gut) of the horse is fricking huge, but can actually displace itself and bend around the wrong way, resulting in obstruction, colic and death without surgical intervention. This can commonly happen after exertion (splenic contraction) and giving birth. Colic due to nephrosplenic entrapment is particularly common after the horse has an adrenaline release, which causes the spleen to temporarily contract, and this seems like a poor design to risk death every time you spook or go for a fast run, especially in a species known for spooking and running fast.

Giving birth is a fast and explosive affair in the horse. The whole pushing business should be over and  done with in about 20 minutes, however this assumes that everything is lined up just right for a normal delivery. Foals are all long legs and necks, which are easy to get tangled or bent around the wrong way. A mare is strong enough to push her foal’s feet through her uterine wall, which is death all round.

Speaking of strength, sometimes horses will kick each other when they have attitude, and they can do so with enough strength to rupture each other’s spleens.

When galloping most horses, best studied in thoroughbreds because they are made to gallop on a regular basis, horses routinely bash their diaphragm with such force against their liver that their liver bruises.

Galloping also often makes their lungs bleed. That’s why racehorses have their head held up after a race, so you don’t see any blood come out their nose and disqualify them. Even horses that you don’t see bleed have evidence of pulmonary bleeding after a gallop if you scope them.

Their leg bones are actually pretty damn tough, but the ends are spindly little things compared to the mass of musculature up top. Their legs are subjected to huge biomechanical forces when a horse runs which can often subject them to ligament damage and lameness. A fractured leg bone can heal like any other, but if a horse can’t bear weight evenly on all four legs for an extended period of time (eg after a fracture) then they are at risk of laminitis.

Laminitis can cause the hoof to slough off. (Aaargh!) They can also get laminitis from eating a bit too well.

Speaking of eating, they can also get colic (and risk death) from eating not enough fiber or the wrong sort of plants or from eating too much dirt.

Oh, and just to mess with you, horses have a space in their head called a guttural pouch which seems to exist for no other reason as far as I can tell (okay, maybe it’s about heat regulation) other than to get fungal infections that eat through the exposed artery and cause the horse to die from blood loss through it’s nose.

And Bonus: Exquisite sensitivity to tetanus and vulnerability to Hendravirus

This list is by no means complete. I haven’t even touched on their anesthetics or drug reactions, but it’s a simple start.

[ask-a-vetblr]

There’s nothing stopping the virus from spreading across all of Australia either right? As long as there are bats, there’s a risk for hendra?

Not all bat species are known to carry Hendra, but basically yes. Wherever the bats go, they can bring Hendra with them.

And this is a particular concern as due to climate change snd habitat destruction, the range of the bats keeps changing. They are a highly mobile species, if they don’t like a habitat they don’t just sit down and die, they fly to a new location. And spread their viruses with them. Plus people insist on keeping horses near recently cleared habitat, and we’re mixing the three species (bat, horse, human) more than we ever have before.

This is partly why the vet profession is so worried. We don’t know how this is going to end, just that the situation is changing in front of us and we don’t want people or horses to die.

A different Anon asked: What are bats doing that far out in the ocean? In the picture you circled for us, parts of the ocean are included. Are bats really that far out from land?

They fly. Bats are one of the early colonisers for islands, being blown off course by strong winds and such. They’re not that far from land, as there are islands all over the place, just from mainland Australia. Which should be concerning.