NAIA Official Blog

The CDC released a report on a rabid Egyptian street dog imported into the United States by a rescue group.

The dog suffering from the disease had to be euthanized, and 18 people underwent rabies postexposure prophylaxis, which is bad news by itself. But what really stands out if you read the full report are three things:

• Only 3 of the 8 imported dog had certificates indicating proper rabies vaccination guidelines had been met.
• The CDC was not informed about these dogs until after they had already entered the United States and left the port of entry.
• Even if the CDC had been notified, the rabid dog most likely still would have been admitted, because its vaccination records were falsified (rescue workers admitted this after the dog’s rabies diagnosis).

This is unacceptable to us, and it should be to you, too. NAIA remains committed to solving this issue, and we will focus our resources on it in 2016.

This it is a problem that shouldn’t exist: if one is committed to rescuing dogs, why look halfway around the world, when there are local dogs in need?