How long do dogs with rabies live?

Rabies in dogs is a fatal disease that affects warm-blooded animals. A pet can become infected with this viral disease from stray animals that have been in contact with wild relatives infected with the rabies virus.

The virus is transmitted through a bite or when the saliva of a sick animal gets into the open wound of a healthy dog. The disease is classified as incurable, and in order to avoid the death of a pet, the disease should be prevented with timely vaccination.

How long is the incubation period for rabies in dogs?

In the initial stages, the disease occurs in a latent form. It develops inside the body without any external manifestations. Like most infectious diseases, the incubation period for rabies in dogs ranges from twenty-one to forty-two days. After this, the disease begins to manifest itself.

A dog with rabies becomes infectious five days before the latent stage expires. The causative agent of the pathology is already beginning to be released into the blood, saliva and feces of the animal. For this reason, it is extremely important for the owner to know how rabies manifests itself in dogs, so as not to miss the primary symptoms.

The main method of infection is a bite, but if the animal has an open wound and saliva from a sick animal gets into it, infection can also occur. The latent course of the disease during alternative infection always coincides with the standard incubation periods. However, there are exceptions to the rules.

There have been cases in history where a pet fell ill three months after contact with a virus carrier. Such statistics are observed only for adult dogs. The virus spreads very quickly in puppies, as they have unstable immunity and are small in size.

The rabies virus (Rabies) is part of the encephalitic group and is transmitted through nerve cells at a speed of up to three millimeters per hour. Since puppies have much shorter neural circuits than adults, incubation time is cut in half. It should also be noted that the latent period for the development of the disease in dwarf breeds is much shorter than in large dogs.

Rabies in Dogs: Symptoms and Signs

The first signs of rabies in dogs have nothing in common with those observed in the active phase of the disease. The pet becomes lethargic, sad and walks with its head down, looking guilty. He tries to spend more and more time alone and play less. The dog sleeps a lot and begins to consume large amounts of liquid.

Veterinarians advise paying attention to severe thirst, since it is the first sign of rabies in dogs. The pet consumes a lot of water, but has no such interest in food. If a dog loves to eat, then the lack of desire to enjoy his favorite treats, combined with thirst, should alert the owner.

Some types of the disease do not affect appetite, but make swallowing difficult for the animal. The pet begins to choke on solid food or large pieces of it. The dog's taste preferences may change; instead of the usual food, it begins to eat wood or earth, which are unsuitable for consumption.

The first symptoms of rabies in dogs are:

• hoarse voice;
• chills;
• irritability and fussiness;
• avoiding bright light;
• severe hair loss.

After the incubation period ends and the disease enters an advanced stage, the virus begins to infect the brain tissue of the animal, which leads to the development of increasing inadequacy and loss of control over the limbs.

The following signs are characteristic of the active stage:

• attack on humans and other animals without reason;
• fear of water;
• attempts to chew your own body parts;
• foaming at the mouth and growling.

Growling for no reason, accompanied by a grin with strong salivation, is also considered a symptom of late rabies. Before death, the animal develops gradual paralysis. First the hind limbs fail, then the front ones. After this, the brain and respiratory centers are paralyzed, resulting in death.

Types of disease

Rabies in dogs can be silent, violent, abortive, atypical and recurrent, it all depends on the strength of the virus infecting the body and on the form of the disease.

Rampage

This type of disease is considered to be the active stage of virus development. This period is divided into three substages. The first substage is characterized by the animal’s solitude and lack of reaction to its name. But if you approach him, he will whine and ask to be petted.

The second substage is characterized by manifestations of aggression, fearfulness, severe irritability, attacks on animals, owners and objects.

The third substage manifests itself in blockage of the larynx. The dog begins to wheeze, its lower jaw drops and saliva flows profusely. The animal constantly howls and whines. At the last substage, paralysis, oppression and death occur. Furious rabies lasts from five to thirteen days.

Quiet fury

This form of the disease is often confused with Aujeszky's disease or pseudorabies. It also leads to damage to the respiratory tract. With this disease, the dog begins to itch and becomes irritable. However, there are much fewer destructive processes in brain tissue than with rabies. But both diseases are fatal. A person is practically not susceptible to this disease. Rabies is equally dangerous for both people and animals.

At one stage of this type of rabies, the pet stops eating, becomes weaker and loses weight. The silent form lasts from two to four days. At the initial stage, the dog does not change behavior and eats normally. As viral activity increases, the animal begins to experience abdominal pain, vomiting and diarrhea. This leads to rabies being confused with intestinal infection and enteritis.

In addition to weight loss and weakness, the dog may experience laryngeal paralysis. At first glance, this condition is similar to when an animal is choking on bones. The owners begin to look into the animal's mouth for a foreign body, and not finding it, they become infected through saliva.

Atypical rabies

This type of disease is classified as a separate subtype of rabies. According to official data, atypical rabies is synonymous with the silent type of the disease. It is called atypical because of its vague symptoms. While everyone can identify the violent type of rabies, even veterinarians often cannot recognize the atypical type.

It is confused with Aujeszky's disease, gastrointestinal disorders and nervous plague. The atypical form of rabies is also characterized by paralysis and epileptic seizures. But unlike nervous plague, in its course there is no conjunctivitis and there is no blockage of the lower jaw, while in rabies it is blocked due to paralysis of the larynx.

Recurrent rabies

This type of rabies is characterized by cyclical, wave-like development. The stages will change from quiet to violent. This transition is repeated many times. The apathetic state becomes stronger each time, and aggression continues to increase. In veterinary medicine, the relapsing form is called remitting.

Often the cycles of the disease are confused with the development of an acute stage, which will be replaced by complete recovery. However, the animal will not be able to recover, as it is doomed. Out of a hundred dogs with such a disease, only one individual can survive, and this is extremely rare. This type of disease is classified as abortive.

Abortive rabies

Before the onset of the acute stage, the disease has typical symptoms. The animal then experiences a dramatic recovery, the mechanism of which is a mystery to veterinarians. Abortive or aborted rabies occurs in 1% of dogs. However, the statistics could have been more positive if rabid pets had not been euthanized.

This form of rabies is also found in humans. Once a similar case was reported in Texas. A homeless woman came to the hospital with symptoms consistent with rabies. The tests taken from her confirmed the presence of infection. After the disease entered the acute stage, the patient did not die, but recovered sharply.

The existence of this type of disease gives hope for the dog’s survival, but should not become an incentive for the owner to inaction, since one should not forget that the rabies virus is particularly dangerous. It is important to promptly determine the type of illness and make a decision on what to do next with the sick animal.

Symptoms of rabies - stages

The incubation (latent) period can last several weeks. The severity of symptoms is influenced by the pet’s age, the state of the immune system, and the concentration of the virus. The disease is usually observed in a quiet, violent or atypical form.

Usually there is a violent form, lasting from six to ten days. There are several stages of this form.

1. Prodromal (lasts two days) – the animal’s behavior changes: it looks depressed, depressed, sits in quiet corners, avoids communication, and reacts inadequately to stimuli.
2. Manic (three to four days) – stage of excitement. The animal behaves aggressively towards animals and people. Aggressive behavior changes to affectionate. The pet wanders, eats everything.
3. Paralytic (up to six days) – depressive. The following symptoms appear: laryngeal paralysis, spasms, convulsions. The dog cannot swallow, saliva constantly flows out. Panic states at loud sounds, coordination of movement changes. Paralysis occurs first in the hind limbs, then in the front limbs. The pet ends up in a coma from which it does not recover (it dies from exhaustion, respiratory and cardiac problems).

A sick dog may bite without barking to warn you about it.

In the quiet form (lasting no more than five days), there is no stage of excitation. The animal is depressed and does not respond to external stimuli. Dies from paralysis of the muscles of the body and pharynx.

The disease cannot be cured and death is sure to occur.

Atypical form (very rare). It is characterized by the following symptoms: behavior changes, the functioning of the central nervous system and gastrointestinal tract is disrupted.

Methods for diagnosing rabies

A blood test for rabies in dogs helps diagnose the disease. While the veterinarian waits for the results, the animal is quarantined in a single cage or room. Without analysis, the dog is quarantined and monitored for two weeks. This period is sufficient to detect rabies without using the blood of a sick animal.

Additional confirmation of infection is a bite mark. It is also a reason for the owner to vaccinate his animal before the dangerous virus has time to lead to irreparable consequences.

Treatment

Unfortunately, there is no cure for hydrophobia for dogs.

Mortality, with the exception of the abortive form, is 100%.

What to do with a sick animal?

At the first sign or suspicion of infection, you should contact a veterinary clinic.

The animal is quarantined for 10 days, all contacts are vaccinated.
If no signs of illness appear during the quarantine period, the animal is considered healthy. If signs of disease appear, the animal is euthanized.

Can rabies be cured?

The disease is classified as incurable. They have been trying to find a cure for it for about half a century, but so far to no avail. The first evidence of rabies patients appeared in the sixteenth century. Since then, a vaccine against this deadly virus has been developed. It was created by a microbiologist from France, Louis Pasteur, in 1885. A cure for lyssavirus began to be invented only in the twenty-first century. It is an artificial coma into which an infected patient is placed.

This method was tested in 2005 on American Gina Gies. She was put into an artificial coma and given immunomodulators. After a week of this condition, the woman began to recover. This technique was tried several more times, but cure occurred only in isolated cases. Based on the experiments, the doctors decided that the recovered patients were infected with abortive rabies, so their method had nothing to do with it, since the patients recovered on their own.

This method has not been tested on dogs. Not only because the treatment is expensive, but also because no one wanted to try the technique on their dog. In addition, vaccinations against this virus, which are given to pets, save the situation. Vaccinating a dog against rabies allows your four-legged friend to develop immunity to the virus and not get sick even if bitten by a rabid dog.

Prevention and treatment of rabies

Should your dog be vaccinated against rabies? This question is probably asked by every owner. Veterinarians consider vaccination a mandatory procedure, especially for purebred dogs. In addition, the vaccine is the only method of preventing a dangerous disease.

Vaccination of dogs takes place in three stages:

• The first vaccination is given to puppies at the age of two months;
• the second vaccination is carried out three weeks later;
• and the third vaccination is given when all the dog’s teeth are replaced.

The animal is then vaccinated every year. Vaccinations are done at the same time, usually with the onset of spring. To obtain the necessary immunity, the animal should not be overworked, overheated or overcooled for a month after vaccination. Also during this period you should avoid stressful situations.

What rabies vaccinations do veterinarians recommend for dogs? The most common vaccines are:

1. Biocan.
2. Rabizin.
3. Nobivac R.
4. Defensor 3.
5. Rabikan.

If an unvaccinated dog is bitten by an infected relative, in order to avoid the development of the disease, emergency vaccination is carried out, which in 98% of cases saves the pet from death.

How can a dog become infected?

Rabies is a disease that has an infectious etiology and is acute. Caused by a virus that attacks the central nervous system, serious disturbances occur within the body.

The causative agent of the disease is rhabdovirus (RNA-containing virus), which affects all animals. It can be artificial and natural

The infection can be transmitted from animals to humans.

You can become infected from infected predators through direct contact (after a bite, when saliva gets into an open wound). Saliva contains the virus. In the body, it travels along nerve pathways to the brain and spinal cord and multiplies in the salivary glands.

It appears in saliva a week before the onset of initial symptoms. During this period, the animal is a carrier of rhabdovirus and can infect humans and other pets.

How to help a bitten dog?

How quickly does rabies develop after being bitten by a dog that has been infected? You can help a bitten pet by carrying out emergency vaccination within a few hours after contact with the infected person. In addition, self-treatment should be completely avoided. The pet must be urgently taken to a veterinarian, even if it is vaccinated.

The veterinarian will provide an immunostimulant that will support the effect of the vaccine and tell you how many more injections of this drug should be administered to the animal. After the therapy, the animal will be completely safe and will not get sick with a deadly disease.

False rabies - what is it?

Pseudorabies (Aujeszky's disease) is an infectious pathology caused by the herpes virus that affects the central nervous system. The carriers are rodents that release a dangerous microorganism into the environment through urine and feces. A dog can become infected by contact with a carrier of the infection, by eating infectious mice or rats, or by eating raw pork. The incubation period is 2–5 days.

False rabies in dogs - signs:

• atypical behavior;
• severe itching;
• loss of appetite, complete refusal to eat;
• increased salivation;
• shortness of breath, heavy breathing;
• severe thirst, sleep disturbance;
• slight increase in temperature indicators;
• the gait becomes unsteady, paralysis of the limbs develops - this is a manifestation of the final stage of the disease, and within a few days the animal dies.

The disease cannot be treated; the only way to prevent it is vaccination. The only difference from ordinary rabies is that Aujeszky's disease is not dangerous to humans, the disease is mild, without any particular complications.

Rabies is a deadly infectious pathology, all dog owners should remember this. Only timely immunization will help protect the animal and all family members from this dangerous disease.

How to help a person bitten by a rabid dog?

A dog bite does not mean that rabies was transmitted to a person from the animal and you need to prepare for the worst. But emergency measures still need to be taken. To prevent the development of the virus, you need to go to an infectious diseases hospital. A person who has been bitten by a dog will be given anti-rabies injections, as well as treatment with antibiotics and immunomodulators.

Antibiotics will help destroy pathogenic microflora, the vaccine will kill the rabies virus, and immunomodulators will strengthen the immune system. If the person bitten does not consult a doctor in time, the first symptoms will begin to appear. They are:

• painful sensations at the site of the bite;
• hyperemia;
• increase in temperature indicators;
• the appearance of shortness of breath;
• difficulty swallowing;
• severe headache;
• weaknesses.

If a person is bitten by a dog, you should immediately consult a doctor, since after the first symptoms appear, it will be too late to call specialists. Only timely medical care will prevent a deadly disease and defeat the virus.