From:
"South Shore Ferret Care"
Date: 2010-04-26 19:25:20 UTC
Subject: [ferrethealth] Shortage of IMRAB Rabies Vaccine
To: ferrethealth@yahoogroups.com
Hi there, I'm looking to see how everyone else, especially the other shelters are going to handle this ongoing and possibly urgent issue.
I just called Merial myselft to find out how much longer the IMRAB rabies vaccines will be on backorder. (It's been 8 plus weeks already) and when I called today, they have no idea when the rabies vaccines that we use for ferrets will be back in stock.
Selfishly speaking, we host an annual Ferret Rabies Clinic and Health Care Day each year typically in April, and have had to postpone it.
We are now unable to vaccinate ferrets at the shelter to maintain their vaccinations and worse we are unable to adopt out ferrets until we can vaccinate them for rabies and have a tag.
Yes, the vets do have "some" IMRAB rabies vaccine at present, but all the vets I have contacted are starting to run low and soon will run out.
How else is everyone handling this?
We took in five new ferrets from various sources (some were strays and have been outdoors) and we have no means to vaccinate them. They are all highly adoptable and we have a few families who have applied to be forever homes.
The answer from Merial is that they are setting no timeframe expectations and have no idea when or if the vaccine will continue to be available from them......
YIKES
With all the ferrets at the shelters already vaccinating them to get them into forever homes should be the least of our worries.....
Ideas Anyone?
Sincerely, Diane Wall, South Shore Ferret Care
[This is not unexpected. Merial has been caught up in
a sale and resale situation, and some product lines may
be temporarily gone. The scary part is that some may
be permanently gone and I don't know any way currently
to check on that, but there SHOULD be pushes by all
ferret organizations to keep the essential products like
IMRAB 3. *****IMRAB 3 is the ONLY rabies vaccine tested so far
which works for at least a year on ferrets with minimal side
effects so if that goes away ferret lose their protected status
in the Compendium for Animal Rabies Control and a second
viable rabies vaccine needs to be found which can only be
done at a few specialized labs and will be costly, but perhaps
the ferret community should press for and pay for that, anyway,
even if IMRAB 3 does not go away.***** In the last couple of years
SEVERAL veterinary pharmaceuticals have changed hands and
in some cases certain product lines have been sold piecemeal
to other companies if there is a buyer.
So, AFA OFFICERS, FERRET CLUB OFFICERS, VETS, etc.:
Your messages to Merial to keep IMRAB 3 and to keep Purevax
CDV vaccine for ferrets ARE ESSENTIAL RIGHT NOW.
Look up
Merial or Merck
in the message body box (other boxes can be left empty) in
http://ferrethealth.org/archive/
Watch in
http://www.animalpharmnews.com/home/
too
See
http://ferrethealth.org/archive/FHL11092
Merial:
http://www.merial.com/
-- Moderator]
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