A family’s beloved 7-year-old German shepherd dog “Buddy” was euthanized earlier this month, 41 days after becoming the first confirmed canine case of COVID-19 in the United States. Buddy’s owners, Allison and Robert Mahoney of Staten Island, New York, have provided a gut-wrenching account of what they and Buddy endured during his final weeks.
The Mountain View Voice is reporting today that although California veterinarian Tejpaul Ghumman’s license was revoked by the state’s Veterinary Medical Board (VMB) earlier this month along with his ‘premise license’ to operate Alta View Animal Hospital, which he co-owns, Alta View Animal Hospital continues to be open for business and Ghumman is continuing to work there.
Only in New York City. Today’s Wall Street Journal has a must-read profile of NYC owner-dog dynamic duo – and avid rat hunters – Elias Schewel and his mixed breed dog, “Sundrop.” Mr. Schewel is part of a group called the Ryders Alley Trencher-Fed Society (yes, R.A.T.S.), according to the profile.
Last week, high-end specialty and emergency veterinary hospital network BluePearl announced in a press release that, based on data from all ninety of its hospitals throughout the United States, there had been a 70% increase in canine parvovirus cases during the COVID-19 pandemic compared with the same period in the previous five years.
TCR is requesting a correction or clarification in a VIN News story by reporter Edie Lau. Lau has not yet made any changes to her story, nor has she responded to TCR’s most recent e-mail. TCR is publishing the exchange with Lau in full:
BluePearl, a high-end network of specialty and emergency veterinary hospitals, announced last week that its hospitals have seen a 70 percent increase in parvovirus cases:
The Canine Review has learned that a dog confirmed to have tested positive for COVID-19 last week in Georgia — this was the fourth confirmed case in a dog in the United States — did not die as a result of coronavirus. Georgia Department of Public Health spokesperson Nancy Nydam told TCR in an email today: “The final necropsy results confirm the dog’s cause of death was a brain tumor. The other dog in the home is not ill and tested negative for SARS-CoV-2.”
A six-year-old mixed breed dog in Georgia has tested positive for COVID-19; however, the dog was not showing any signs of respiratory illness, according to Georgia’s Department of Public Health. The dog “developed sudden onset of neurological illness which progressed rapidly over the course of a couple of days, and was humanely euthanized,” Georgia’s Department of Public Health said in a statement on Monday.
On Monday morning, Oxford University Press chief executive officer Nigel Portwood declined to answer questions about how OUP supervises its journals and oversees its policies with regard to conflicts of interest and disclosure. His answer was limited to an apparent acquiescence to the Journal of Animal Science’s limited addendum ‘for clarity,’ which did not concede or specify the authors’ direct conflict of interest in a controversial article about canine dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) – a progressive heart disease that can eventually lead to congestive heart failure – and possible links to certain types of diets.
Although maintaining that “that the absence of a broader COI [Conflict of Interest] statement by the authors does not constitute […]