Doggy Mentor

If there’s one common theme that we can see in many of the 850+ customers we’ve worked with over the past two years, it’s this: people don’t seem to comprehend just how aggressive and fast-acting the Canine Parvo virus is.

You can go to bed one night, with a perfectly healthy-looking, happy dog, and wake up in the morning to a very sick one – and, yes, the title of this article is not just a play on a popular expression, because Parvo has an unmistakable smell, as the diarrhea, which is frequently one of the first symptoms to appear with the latest 2c strain of this virus, is foul and unlike anything else you may have come across before.

We had one customer, in the Pacific Northwest, whose dog first showed symptoms of Parvo on a Sunday morning, and by later that afternoon, it was already dead.

Even when this virus doesn’t claim your dog’s life quite so quickly, too many people sit around for day after day, with their dog clearly not well, and doing absolutely nothing about it, because they think they have time.

But nothing could be further from the truth!

You know what dogs are like – most of them, if not all, absolutely love their food, so if you noticed that your dog skipped even one meal, wouldn’t you be concerned that something could be gravely wrong?

Even if one of our dogs throws up, if they’re healthy (and ours are), then they are ready to eat again just minutes later, so a dog that’s off his food for several hours (which is often the very first sign you’ll see that your dog has Parvo, provided you’re observant, of course) should be a massive, red warning sign.

Unfortunately, there is such a lot of bad advice around about Parvo that a lot of dog owners are lulled into a false sense of security.

People feel safe because:

• Their dog is vaccinated and up-to-date on all of its shots. And now for the reality: Parvo vaccines are not effective against the 2c strain (which is why many of our customers are finding that even their adult dogs are being infected, and dying, from this virus, even though they’ve had all of their vaccinations), and can even give your dog full-blown Parvo symptoms (particularly if your dog was vaccinated after he’s been infected, which is about the worst thing you can do).
• They have an adult dog, and everybody knows that Parvo only affects puppies. Oops, wrong again! Parvo may still primarily be a puppy illness, but more and more adult dogs are getting it now as well. If this sounds like a broken record, then we’re not making any apologies, but vaccinations don’t work like they used to – the latest 2c strain of Parvo is just too strong and most vaccines on the market today are only effective against the older 2a and 2b strains (and that’s not to mention the long-term issues with all vaccinations, which most vets won’t tell you about).
• They try to do the right thing by having their dog tested for Parvo at the vet’s, but do nothing because the test comes back negative. Reality check time again: the 2c strain of Parvo is well-known for generating a false-negative result, and this particularly applies to the in-clinic stool sample tests that are very popular these days. This means that although you are told your dog does not have Parvo, he actually does, and that leads to more days of inaction while your dog is getting sicker and sicker.
• They never take their dog outside, which means it won’t get infected by the Parvo virus. This is another myth, as one of the most common reasons why indoor dogs get Parvo is because they get it from their owners / breeders! It’s true, you can walk this virus into your house without even knowing it (or transmit it via your hands or clothes). That’s why we always suggest that people (including visitors) change their shoes whenever they go indoors.

So, given that there is a ton of bad advice and uninformed hearsay to be found, mainly on the Internet, of course, where can you go to get up-to-date and reliable information that you can use, knowing that, rather than harming your dog and making matters worse, it will actually increase his chances of surviving this most devastating of viruses?

This actually highlights another major issue to do with Parvo: many dog owners have never heard of Parvo (until their vet tells them that’s why their dog is sick), which means they don’t know what to look out for. Even more amazing, to us, is that we come across many breeders who know nothing about this virus either. For people in the doggie business, this is basic knowledge that you simply should have!

Well, the good news is that we have written a free, 100+ page ebook all about Parvo, called Parvo Treatment 101, that you can download to your computer in minutes.

This book contains more or less everything you need to know about Parvo (e.g. the symptoms, including the different types of stool to look out for, treatment options), which makes it a great place to start.

However, if your dog is already sick (i.e. a vet has confirmed that he has the Parvovirus, or he shows any of the classic symptoms, or even if you know he’s been exposed within the past few days), then you don’t have time to read this book now – you need to administer Parvo treatment right away, because there’s one thing you don’t have with this virus, and that is time. You can always read our free book later, once your dog is stabilized, or better.

We hope that you found this article both interesting and useful, and if it helps you save your dog’s life, even better. However, we do have a load more information about Parvo treatment for you, which is in addition to what’s in our free book.

We’d like to close by encouraging all dog owners to at least be educated about just how devastating this virus can be, and about the various treatment options (you don’t need to take your dog to the vet and spend anywhere from $500 USD to over $10,000 USD, for a success rate that offers no better odds than tossing a coin, because effective, inexpensive, safe Parvo home remedies do exist), so please, if you know anybody with a dog, then do forward this article, and/or our free book, on to them – you just never know who might need it, and there’s no better feeling than knowing that you’ve helped to save somebody’s beloved pet from an excruciatingly painful death from probably the most devastating doggie virus there is.

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