“Puppies can only be effectively vaccinated against rabies from the 12th week, after which it takes three weeks for the protection to be effective. But the smuggled puppies from illegal trade are mostly much too young for the vaccination. The measures taken, the flow of information and the establishment of a crisis team in Bremen are of course sensible. However, the cause must be fought: The illegal trade via online platforms such as eBay classifieds or Quoka, the main sales channel for illegal puppy traders. We therefore call on the federal government to take the problem of the illegal puppy trade seriously and finally introduce laws for the online trade in animals. In addition, this shows once again how useful an EU-wide labeling and registration obligation would be, because the uncertain origin of the puppy is now making the work of the crisis team even more difficult. Such an obligation already exists in most European countries, Germany is sadly at the bottom here.”
Rabies is primarily transmitted through a bite from infected animals – including humans – and is usually fatal. Ninety-nine percent of recent human rabies cases were transmitted by dogs. Puppies under the age of six months are particularly affected by the disease. After contact with an animal suspected of having rabies, the person concerned must be immunized immediately – even if they have previously been vaccinated against rabies. This nerve cell-targeted virus is primarily transmitted directly through bite contact with infected saliva. Transmission to domestic animals and humans is independent of the origin of the pathogen.
According to estimates by the World Health Organization (WHO), 59,000 people die from rabies worldwide every year. But the number of unreported cases is much higher. The last time a person died of rabies in Germany was in 2007 after being bitten by a stray dog in Morocco. The last known case of rabies in a dog in Germany was in Bavaria in 2013, in a puppy imported from Morocco. Germany itself has been considered rabies-free since 2008. In many Eastern European countries such as Romania or Ukraine, rabies in pets is still a problem.
Find out more about the illegal puppy trade here.