Rabies is a viral disease of the nervous system. Once clinical signs appear it is essentially always fatal, in animals and in people. It is also entirely preventable by vaccination, which is why vaccination is a legal requirement for owned cats and dogs in Türkiye.

How it spreads

Through the saliva of an infected animal, almost always by a bite. It can also enter through a scratch or through saliva contacting broken skin or the eyes, nose or mouth.

The virus travels along the nerves to the brain. The incubation period is typically between two weeks and three months, but can be much longer, which is why a bite weeks ago still matters.

The signs

Rabies is unpredictable in presentation. Any unexplained neurological or behavioural change in an unvaccinated animal should raise the question.

Early stage. A marked change in temperament: a friendly dog becoming withdrawn or irritable, a shy dog becoming unusually affectionate. Fever. Licking or chewing at the site of an old bite.

Furious form. Restlessness and agitation, aggression without provocation, biting at objects and at the air, roaming, a change in the sound of the bark, chewing and swallowing inedible objects.

Paralytic form. Increasing weakness starting in the hind limbs, a dropped jaw, inability to swallow, and the profuse drooling that gives rise to the classic image of foaming at the mouth. Then paralysis, coma and death.

Not all rabid animals are aggressive. The paralytic form is common and looks like a dog that has something stuck in its throat, which is dangerous, because that is exactly the situation in which someone puts their hand into the mouth.

Never put your hand in the mouth of a drooling dog that cannot swallow, unless you know its rabies status.

If you have been bitten

Wash the wound immediately with plenty of soap and running water for at least fifteen minutes. This physically removes virus and is the single most effective first step.
Go to a hospital straight away. Post-exposure treatment is highly effective when it is started promptly, and it must not be delayed.
Do not kill or lose the animal if it can be safely confined, since it needs to be observed or tested.
Report it. Rabies is a notifiable disease in Türkiye.

If your animal has been bitten

Do not handle the wound with bare hands. Confine the animal safely and contact us immediately with its vaccination history. A currently vaccinated animal is in a very different position from an unvaccinated one.

Vaccination

Rabies vaccination is compulsory for owned cats and dogs in Türkiye and is repeated at set intervals. It is recorded with the animal’s registration details and is required for travel abroad.

It protects your animal, it protects your household, and it means that if a bite incident ever occurs, the situation is manageable rather than an emergency of the worst kind.