Wake Up And Smell The Parvo!

Posted by Puppy Trainer on June 27th, 2009 filed in Dogs

During the past two years or so, we’ve worked with well over 850 customers, and we’ve noticed one common thread, which is: dog owners don’t understand just how fast-acting and aggressive the Canine Parvo virus is.

You can go to bed one night, with a perfectly healthy-looking, happy dog, and wake up in the morning to a very sick one - and, yes, the title of this article is not just a play on a popular expression, because Parvo has an unmistakable smell, as the diarrhea, which can often be one of the first symptoms you’ll see with the latest 2c strain of this virus, is absolutely disgusting and unlike anything else you may have experienced before.

As an example, one of our customers, in the Pacific Northwest, noticed that their dog was sick with Parvo on a Sunday morning, and later that very same day, in the late afternoon, it had already died.

Even when this virus doesn’t claim your dog’s life quite so quickly, too many dog owners sit around for days on end, watching their dog suffer, and doing nothing about it, because they suffer from the mistaken belief that they have time.

But they don’t!

You know what dogs are like - most of them, if not all, absolutely love their food, so if you noticed that your dog skipped even one meal, wouldn’t you be concerned that something could be seriously wrong?

Even if one of our dogs throws up, if they’re healthy (and ours are), then they are ready to eat again just minutes later, so a dog that’s off his food for several hours (which is in many cases the very first sign you’ll see that your dog has Parvo, assuming that you’re observant, of course) should be a massive, red warning sign.

Unfortunately, there is so much bad advice around about Parvo that many dog owners are understandably but ill-advisedly complacent.

These dog owners feel secure because:

• Their dog is vaccinated and up-to-date on all of its shots. And now for the reality: Parvo vaccines are not effective against the 2c strain (which is why we are seeing more and more customers with fully-vaccinated adult dogs still getting Parvo and, if they’re not treated, dying), and can even give your dog full-blown Parvo symptoms (especially if your dog is given his shot after he was infected, which is about the worst possible thing you can ever do).
• They have an adult dog, and everybody knows that Parvo only affects puppies. Oops, wrong again! Parvo may still primarily be a puppy illness, but more and more adult dogs are getting it now as well. If this sounds like a broken record, then we’re not making any apologies, but vaccinations do not work like they used to - the latest 2c strain of Parvo is just too strong and the vaccine manufacturers really haven’t caught up with it yet (and that’s besides the long-term health problems with all vaccinations, which most vets keep quiet about).
• They take their dog to the vet’s to have it tested, and the test comes back negative, so they do nothing. Reality check time again: the 2c strain of Parvo is well-known for generating a false-negative result, and this particularly applies to the stool sample-based tests that most vets conduct in their clinics nowadays. This means that although you are told your dog does not have Parvo, he actually does, and that leads to more days of inaction while your dog is getting sicker and sicker.
• They never take their dog outside, which means it won’t get infected by the Parvo virus. Sorry to burst this balloon as well, but one of the most common reasons why dogs who are confined to living indoors all of the time get Parvo is because it is their owners (or breeders) who give it to them! Yes, people walk this virus into their house without realizing it (or take it in on their clothes or hands). That’s why we always suggest that people (including visitors) change their shoes whenever they go indoors.

So, with so many myths floating around, not to mention bad advice, where can you go to get up-to-date and reliable information that you can use, knowing that, rather than harming your dog and making matters worse, it will actually increase his chances of surviving this most devastating of viruses?

This actually highlights another major issue to do with Parvo: many dog owners have never heard of Parvo (until their vet tells them that’s why their dog is sick), which means they don’t know what to look out for. Even more amazing, to us, is that we come across many breeders who know nothing about this virus either. For people in the doggie business, this is basic knowledge that you simply should have!

Well, the good news is that we have put together a free, 100+ page ebook all about Parvo, called Parvo Treatment 101, that you can download to your computer in minutes.

This book contains more or less everything you need to know about Parvo (e.g. the symptoms, including the different types of stool to look out for, treatment options), which makes it a great place to start.

However, if your dog is already sick (i.e. a vet has confirmed that he has the Parvovirus, or he shows any of the classic symptoms, or even if you know he’s been exposed within the past few days), then you don’t have time to read this book now - you need to administer Parvo treatment right away, because there’s one thing you don’t have with this virus, and that is time. You can always read our free book later, once your dog is stabilized, or better.

We hope that you found this article both interesting and useful, and if it helps you save your dog’s life, even better. However, we do have a load more information about Parvo treatment for you, which is in addition to what’s in our free book.

If nothing else, we hope we’ve inspired you to find out more about this devastating virus, and about the treatment options that are available (you don’t need to take your dog to the vet’s and spend anywhere from $500 USD to over $10,000 USD, with a mere 50% success rate, because effective, inexpensive, safe home Parvo remedies are available), so please, if you know anybody with a dog, then do forward this article, or our free book, on to them - you just never know when they might might need it, and there’s no better feeling than knowing that you’ve helped to save somebody’s beloved pet from the excruciatingly painful death that the Canine Parvovirus often brings.