Vaccine Hesitancy Now Affects Dogs, Putting Humans at Risk

Source: Mikhail Nilov/Pexels

The heated controversy over the safety of vaccines and whether they might trigger autism or immune-mediated diseases in humans has become widespread. Now it has spilled over and is affecting whether our pet dogs are routinely vaccinated. This, in turn, may ultimately affect the health of thousands of people.

Many Pet Owners Have Become Vaccine-Hesitant

A recent study by Simon Haeder at Texas A&M University queried 2,853 dog owners and 1,977 cat owners about the vaccine status of their pets. The results showed that around 1 in 5 dog owners (22 percent) and nearly the same percentage of cat owners (26 percent) were vaccine-hesitant. The data also indicated that these are the same individuals who are shying away from vaccinating themselves or their children. This should not be a surprise, as research has shown that around 90 percent of dog owners consider their pet to be part of their family.

This is not a purely American trend. A study by Shona Bloodworth at the University of Liverpool looked at the medical records of 712,266 dogs and 306,888 cats and found an even higher level of vaccine hesitancy in the UK. Specifically, the results showed that 31 percent of dogs and 34 percent of cats in that part of the world were going without vaccination.

The data from studies like these indicate that a substantial number of dog owners fear that vaccines can lead to physical problems and behavioral changes, including conditions like autism (even though no substantive data show that autism even exists in canines).

Actually, veterinary medicine has its own group of anti-vaccine advocates. When doing research for this post, I checked out the website of Children’s Health Defense, which is the anti-vaccine group founded by US Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. It includes a recommended list of books that universally argue against the use of vaccines in humans. However, much to my surprise, near the top of that list was a book by a holistic veterinarian, Marcie Fallek. The book is described as demonstrating the “tremendous harm” caused by annual vaccination of pets. In it, she writes about “vaccinosis,” a term she uses to describe a range of adverse health effects that she believes are caused by the reaction of an animal’s immune system to vaccines. Unfortunately, the book itself offers little credible scientific data to support beyond anecdotal case reports.

Why Are People Afraid of Vaccination?

Sadly, we live in a media-dominated era where the unschooled opinions of social influencers and celebrities such as Jim Carrey, Robert De Niro, Jessica Biel, Letitia Wright, and Charlie Sheen carry more weight than scientific data from unfamiliar researchers at Harvard Medical School or Stanford University. Because of that, anti-vaccine sentiments have grown from a seed of doubt into a cultural movement that claims there is a link between vaccination and diseases like autism.

Suppose, for the sake of argument, we accept as fact that something like canine autism exists. Based on extrapolation from human data, can we then link this disorder to vaccination? The association between vaccination in humans and the development of autism has actually been scientifically rejected. This idea originated in 1998 when a study by a British doctor, Andrew Wakefield, claimed to have evidence showing that the popular combination vaccine for measles, mumps, and rubella resulted in an increased frequency of autism. This study was later found to be fraudulent and was retracted by the journal; the fraud was considered egregious enough that Wakefield was stripped of his right to practice medicine in the UK. As of this writing, 19 subsequent studies from seven countries have tested this association. In total, they used a cumulative database of over a million individuals. All of these investigations have consistently reported that individuals who have been vaccinated are not more likely to develop autism than those who have not received vaccines.

Not Vaccinating Is a Danger to Dogs

In the case of dogs, failure to vaccinate raises the risk level, not only for the dogs themselves, but also for humans. In the United States and Canada, dogs are routinely vaccinated for several diseases, invariably including rabies, canine parvovirus, and canine distemper. If your dog shows symptoms of rabies, you are dealing with a 100 percent fatality rate. If your dog contracts canine parvovirus, even with the best treatment available, the likelihood that it will still die is over 90 percent. If it contracts canine distemper, the likelihood that it will die is around 70 percent. But the impact of vaccination of dogs affects much more than the survival rate of canines; it affects the lives of people as well.

Dogs That Are Not Vaccinated Are a Risk Factor for Humans

To illustrate the global importance of canine vaccination, the most important thing to note is that rabies is a killer. It is contracted from the bite of a rabid animal and can be transmitted to people as well. I have already mentioned that for a dog that begins to show symptoms, the disease is 100 percent deadly, and the same is true for a human. The only chance of salvation is if you can treat the person who has been bitten by a rabid animal before they begin to show symptoms, and this treatment has traditionally involved a series of unpleasant and painful shots. According to the World Health Organization, approximately 70,000 people (most in Asia and Africa) die of rabies each year.

Let’s break that down. In the US and Canada, rabies vaccinations are legally required for dogs in all states and provinces. In North America, human deaths due to rabies are quite rare. In the US, only one to three cases occur annually, and these are exclusively contracted from infected wild animals (typically bats, raccoons, skunks, and coyotes). Contrast this to the approximately 24,000 people who die of rabies annually in Africa and the estimated 31,000 human deaths that annually result from rabies in Asia. In both Africa and Asia, 99 percent of human rabies deaths are caused by bites from unvaccinated dogs. It is also worth pointing out that approximately 40 percent of the human victims who die of rabies are children. According to one estimate, if vaccinations for rabies in dogs ceased in the US, the number of human deaths resulting from the bites of rabid dogs could be expected to skyrocket from three victims to over 12,000 per year.

Animal Behavior Essential Reads

When Should Your Therapy Dog Retire?

Are You Stressed, Lonely, or Disconnected?

Holistic veterinarians admit that they have no cure or holistic preventive measures for rabies. So, what do they recommend for the world that they hope will come, where most dogs are not vaccinated? Marcie Fallek’s solution is, “If your pet has never been vaccinated, it is best not to take them to dog parks or public areas where there are unknown or unvaccinated animals.” In other words, following the recommendations of anti-vaccine advocates not only places your dog’s life in direct jeopardy but also condemns it to a world of isolation with no contact with any other dogs.

Copyright SC Psychological Enterprises Ltd. May not be reprinted or reposted without permission.