Pets increase the risk of infection

Pets increase the risk of infection

15/08/2011

With the attitude of pets is often accompanied by an increased risk of infection of various diseases, warns Professor Volker Schuster of the Department of Children and Adolescents at the University of Leipzig in conversation with the news agency „dpad“. The risk of infection is underestimated by many pet owners, the expert continued.

The infections caused by pets can bring significant health effects, said the Leipzig physicians. So for example „About every tenth child with salmonella in his blood, the pathogens captured by contact with pets“, stressed Schuster. According to the expert, not only ordinary pets such as cats, dogs or guinea pigs come under consideration as transmitters of dangerous infectious diseases, but also exotic animals such as snakes, turtles and iguanas.

Salmonella infections by pets
For example, according to the Professor of the Leipzig University Hospital, pet ownership increases the risk of Salmonella infection. Through contact with dogs, cats but also turtles, snakes and iguanas, the pathogens can be transmitted relatively easily and cause serious health problems, said the expert. When stroking the animals, the pathogens reach the hands and from there, for example, through contact with food in the mouth. Therefore, after contact with the animals, thorough hand washing is required in any case, warned Professor Schuster. In snakes and iguanas, this applies as well as in dogs or cats, since even the contact with the skin of the animals could lead to a salmonella infection (salmonellosis). The consequences are especially for children and already weakened people a significant health risk dar. The typical symptoms include fever, convulsive abdominal pain, diarrhea, nausea and vomiting include. In the worst case, however, the infection can be deadly, as the approximately 30 deaths in Germany reported by the Robert Koch Institute illustrate each year. Therefore, pet owners should be aware of the existing risk „Of course, ask if you really should keep snakes or iguanas in an apartment where even small children play“, explained Professor Schuster.

Hygiene rules reduce the risk of infection
According to the expert, compliance with a few simple hygiene rules could help protect against salmonella infection, „but they are not always respected.“ For example, the Leipzig doctor warned for regular hand washing, „at least before the meal and after the toilet visit.“ For children, the parents are increasingly encouraged to pay attention to hygiene, the expert continued. In around ten per cent of the cases in which Salmonella is detected in the blood of children, the pathogens were transmitted through contact with pets, and „Salmonella can sometimes be detected in children's stools even after months“, stressed Professor Schuster in an interview with the news agency „DAPD“. According to the figures of the Society for Consumer Research (GfK), the increased risk of infection from pets applies to around 15 million of the total of 40 million households in Germany. According to GfK, cats live in just under eight million households and dogs in five million households. In addition, according to the GfK, birds (for example budgerigars) and rodents such as guinea pigs and hamsters are among the most popular pets.

Parrot disease and monkey pox
Budgerigars, according to Professor Schuster, may be infected with the parrot disease, which is also transmissible to humans and causes significant health problems. The infectious disease caused by so-called chlamydia manifests itself in humans as a severe pneumonia and can end without medical treatment quite deadly, said Schuster. The attitude of rats, according to the Leipzig doctor under certain circumstances may cause an increased risk of infection because they can transmit the so-called monkey pox on humans. A monkey pox infection is similar in its pathology to infection with human poxviruses that have been eradicated since the 1970s. But „Monkeypox usually fortunately has a lighter course in humans“ as an infection with the human poxviruses, said the Leipzig physicians. Overall, the health risk of pets transmitted infections should not be underestimated and the pet owners should be aware of this risk, the expert warned.

Reduced risk of allergies by pets
The increased risk of infection by keeping pets, however, is associated with a reduced susceptibility to allergies, so the result of a beginning of June in the journal „Clinical & Experimental Allergy“ published study by scientists from the Detroit Henry Ford Hospital. Ganesa Wegienka and colleagues found in their studies that the risk of allergy is determined by adolescents, especially in the first years of life and the contact with pets here not as previously assumed an increased risk of allergy, but this tends to rather reduced. According to the US researchers, for example, adolescents who have close contact with cats during the first year of life are at least 50 percent less likely to be allergic to cat hair. Although this positive correlation could not be equally confirmed in all animals, as a tendency for the adolescents, a reduced risk of allergies in contact with pets, said Wegienka and colleagues. (Fp)

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Image: Vera Winandy-Rank