By Ashley Clark [1]
BELLEVILLE – The Quinte Humane Society [2] is warning [3] dog owners about a highly contagious virus affecting dogs in the community.
On December 29, QHS sent out a news release saying, “Parvovirus has been detected in a number of dogs at the shelter.” The website says QHS do vaccinate dogs upon arrival, but there were puppies too young to be vaccinated who were susceptible to the virus.
Parvovirus [4] attacks quickly and can be life-threatening to all dogs, though puppies under four months and dogs who have not been vaccinated are more at risk. The virus affects the intestinal tract, which leads to symptoms like vomiting, diarrhea and loss of appetite. The dehydration brought on by these symptoms are what can end up being fatal.
The virus is spread by other dogs, people, or anything that has been in contact with an infected animal’s stool.
With the virus affecting dogs in the Belleville area, QHS is urging people to get their dogs vaccinated to help stop the virus from spreading.
The website states that they are currently caring for a puppy with the virus and have seen cases before this one. With this, the shelter has closed the dog area for a few weeks until the animals are no longer at risk, while also increasing the cleaning protocols and limiting staff contact with the dogs.
QNet News will have more on the story.