Other stories cover the risk of Salmonella infections from small pet turtles, an outbreak of Campylobacter tied to raw milk, how closing an Ohio power plant may benefit fish in Lake Erie, and advice on preparing young kids for dogs in the house (and vice versa).

Thanks for reading, and have a happy and healthy weekend!

Eight-year-old survives rabies
United Press International

Deadly rabies fear after man shows off bat in box
MSNBC

Pet Turtles Carry Salmonella Dangers, CDC Warns
U.S. News and World Report

35 cases of illness tied to Pa. farm’s raw milk
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Panel defends call to censor bird flu studies
Chicago Tribune

Vietnam reports 2nd bird flu death in a month
Boston Globe

Healing soldiers, one dog at a time
MSNBC

Ohio power plant closing may help Lake Erie’s fish
CBS News

Baby on the way? Make time to prepare your pet
New Orleans Times-Picayune

Asheville pet experts recommend teaching children how to interact with animals
Asheville Citizen-Times (N.C.)

Irwin Stovroff, an 89-year-old World War II veteran, started a charity in 2007 called Vets Helping Heroes (vets as in veterans, not veterinarians). He raised $3 million to provide American veterans with therapy dogs. It costs about $70,000 to train each dog in the program. Since the program started, about 80 veterans have been given dogs.

I’ll admit that I teared up watching this story last night, but I smiled, too. Watching people whose lives were affected by PTSD find solace and companionship in these dogs is a beautiful thing.

And, as Strovroff explained, the use of therapy dogs isn’t new: “The American Red Cross, after World War II, used pets in convalescent homes, to help our troops.  So, this relationship goes back many, many years and it’s a win-win,” he told NBC News.

Before reading this story, the only things I’d seen about animal hoarding were the occasional story on the local news, and an episode of the show Hoarders. It was the first and only episode I’ve ever seen, because the show, while compelling, is deeply disturbing and emotional. While the series explores different types of hoarding, the episode I saw was about animal hoarding: a man who hoarded rats, and a woman who hoarded cats. Over the course of that 45-minute episode, I saw a life many of us will never experience or understand. While the people on the show were being filmed, they weren’t exploited, as is so often the case with reality TV. They seemed to want to change their lives: the man with the rats sobbed when hundreds of them were taken from his home, but he knew he was making a better life for them and for himself; the woman with the cats, after first seeming to want help, lashed out and refused to allow camera crews or animal control officers into her house, even after her father pleaded with her to let them in. I believe she eventually did allow the cats to be removed from the home and receive proper care.

Animal hoarding brings out a lot of feelings: how could people live this way? How could they accumulate this many animals, and then fail to provide them with adequate nutrition or even a litter box? How could someone have so many rats in their house that there are rats living in the walls? People also think it’s something that’s easy to make fun of, but the problems experienced by the humans and animals are serious. Most of the time, human and animal health is at risk.

Hoarding will be classified as a disorder, the article linked above says, which means it will be easier for people to get help — and usually interventions are the only way.

Thanks for reading, and have a happy and healthy weekend!

Bird Flu Studies Temporarily Paused, Journals Announce
PBS NewsHour

Bird-Flu Virus Engineered in Wisconsin Lab Isn’t Fatal, Scientist Says
Bloomberg News

Pandemic 2009 H1N1 virus gives wings to avian flu
Nature

Brain Diseases May Spread from Animals to Humans More Easily than Thought
MyHealthNewsDaily

Shedding Light on Animal Hoarding
San Francisco Chronicle

Study finds the love of a dog or cat helps women cope with HIV/AIDS
Medical Xpress

How dogs spread happiness
USA Today

The heated battle for, and against, unpasteurized milk
Seattle Times

E. coli found in raw milk dairy’s calf area
CBS News

Coral reefs and fish depend on each other
United Press International