Читать книгу Infectious Disease Management in Animal Shelters - Группа авторов - Страница 69

The segregation of animals entering shelters is essential for proper welfare, infectious disease control, staff safety, and compliance with animal control procedures. Different species should be housed separately from one another. Depending on a particular shelter's mission and functions, animals should be segregated into wards according to their physical, behavioral, adoption availability and legal holding status. For example, common ward designations include one or more areas for “healthy holding,” adoption, and isolation. Proper traffic patterns throughout the shelter that direct people and animals from areas housing healthy and vulnerable animals first to areas housing sick animals last are important to minimize disease transmission and maintain health. Other considerations for animal segregation include the following:

 Kittens and puppies younger than four to five months are particularly susceptible to infectious disease, and extra care must be taken to limit their exposure – these holding areas should be easy to disinfect and have extra attention paid to close monitoring and appropriate biosecurity. However, biosecurity should not be emphasized to the extent that it becomes a barrier to socialization or adoption, as minimizing the LOS is particularly key to ensuring the proper social and emotional development of very young animals.

 Geriatric animals require comfortable, quiet quarters with secure footing and extra careful attention to stress reduction.

 Separate, quiet and low‐stress housing areas are essential for fearful and reactive cats and dogs.

 A variety of separate flexible areas or wards can be used to meet the needs of those animals with special needs such as nursing mothers, neonatal orphans, animals awaiting foster care, those with non‐infectious illness, etc.

 Isolation areas are used to segregate sick animals from the general population. Immediate isolation of sick animals is critical for effective disease control. Isolation should be targeted by species, age, and disease.

 Quarantine areas are used to segregate animals that appear healthy for observation for signs of disease. The routine use of conventional quarantines is more detrimental than beneficial in most animal shelters, but they can be of considerable value in specific instances, for example, observing animals involved in transport programs or during disease outbreaks, A plan should be in place for establishing quarantine areas if the need arises.

Thus, a variety of holding, adoption, and isolation areas is necessary for proper segregation of the population. Please see the Introduction in Chapter 1 and Chapter 6 on Outbreak Management for more information about population management, isolation and quarantine protocols.