SC causes death of entire family of Meerkats

[LostMyMind]

Someone please tell me rabies shots are painful for more than the prick.

(Never had rabies shots) As I understand, rabies shots are shot into the belly (not the arm). Which makes the prick is painful. And the meds suppose to have a nasty effect on ya for a few hours.

So yes, rabies shots are not fun to have. But it's a great lesson to learn for playing with wild animals. 99% of animals in the zoo are tamed but not domesticated, they're still wild.

**edit

I looked it up; it's 5 shots to the upper arm. It's been a while, since I've bother with rabies shots information

[skeptic53]

Fear of needles is not rational, just like most other intense fears (flying, snakes, spiders, etc etc). Most shots, including the aftermath aching, are less painful than bruises from playing soccer or basketball. Most people, including kids, know this intellectually but they still fear the shot.

I've known people with lots of tattoos who refuse to have their blood drawn!! Almost all kids, and many adults, hate the *thought* of shots. They have to be coerced or forced by psychology, guilt, or actual physical force into getting shots.

The SC in this terrible story is the mother, who never taught her daughter to follow rules, and who acquiesced to her daughter's natural dislike of shots.

The secondary SC in this story is whatever government entity requires euthanizing and examining the animal, rather than quarantine. Animals in zoos are confined and monitored every day, what were the chances the meerkats had rabies? About the same as someone getting hit by a meteor in the parking lot.

This slavish adherence to bureaucracy is in the same category as schools that have "zero tolerance for drugs" and that will suspend kids for using an asthma inhaler, or for taking Midol for cramps. Lunacy, sheer mind-numbing lunacy.

[imany]

Dude, who the heck likes shots, anyway? That mom is retarded. I wonder how that kid dealt with all the shots you have to get when you're little, anyway. But, anyway, once upon a time, I was also a stupid kid who ignored the barriers around a zoo animal.

I was 9 or so and had gone on vacation with my mom to Taiwan, and we went with some aunties and cousins to this little amusement park type thing that also had a zoo. Well, this zoo had a monkey. It had a red face and gray fur, and it was in a cage. The cage was really small for a monkey to live in... if I'd been that monkey, I guess I would have been pretty pissed, too. Well, anyway, this cage was behind this fence, but there was a gap in the fence, quite big enough for 9-year-old me to slip through. I was thinking I could shake hands with the monkey and be friends with it, you know. BUT NO. It reached out, and scratched me, IN THE EYE! I started screaming and everything, and the next thing I know I'm being carted off to the ER. They didn't even ask me if I wanted the shot. The nurse just told me to pull my pants down and jabbed me in my very tender butt! Yeah... and then I had to wear an eyepatch for a week.

Anyway, moral of the story... wild animals are for looking, not for touching!

[MadMike]

(Never had rabies shots) As I understand, rabies shots are shot into the belly (not the arm). Which makes the prick is painful. And the meds suppose to have a nasty effect on ya for a few hours.

Actually, they don't do it that way anymore. I posted about my own experience earlier in this thread. It also doesn't require nearly as many as it used to when they still did it in the belly.

I had to get six to start out with, one of which was a tetanus shot. The number of shots required initially has to do with how much you weigh, so a 9-year-old probably would have only need half as many as I did. For me, they did one in each arm, one in each leg, and one in each butt cheek.

Then I had to come back a few times after that for a follow-up shot, which they simply did in the arm.

To answer One-Fang's question: The tetanus shot was the worst of the bunch. The rest of them hurt a lot less.

[skeptic53]

Dude, who the heck likes shots, anyway?

I should have made it more clear... I didn't mean to imply that anyone should like shots. I just meant that the intense fear that some people have is not something you can intellectually convince them out of very easily. Especially a kid. Therefore, the mom should have said "No choice, you're getting the shots".

[Seanette]

I should have made it more clear... I didn't mean to imply that anyone should like shots. I just meant that the intense fear that some people have is not something you can intellectually convince them out of very easily. Especially a kid. Therefore, the mom should have said "No choice, you're getting the shots".

My parents certainly would have done so. I would too, especially if the alternative were for a bunch of innocent animals to die for no *good* reason (please note: I am NOT an animal-rights type or vegetarian).

If that had been my kid, she'd have gotten the shots, all right, and probably wouldn't have felt a thing, as warm as her backside would have been for the stunt she'd pulled. Nine is old enough to understand that fences, barriers, etc., are placed for a reason, and that it is WAY out of line for her to take it on herself to circumvent same.

[Crow The Robot]

They should put this family on display in the meerkat habitat or something. I dunno, i hrew upin the country and so i saw wild animals and knew they were just that wild, not domestic, you don't pet a racoon or possum. On second thought they should put the family in a jackass enclosure.

[HYHYBT]

Great.... all through reading this thread, I was copying out quotes and replying to them, to put it all in one post, and accidentally erased it. And it's too long to reread just for that, so the few I can remember, with apologies for not remembering who's said what:

No, they shouldn't have had to kill the meerkats. Quarantine should have been plenty, and to my mind, if someone wants to risk their life by not taking the shots it should be completely on them, without testing the animal at all unless it seems sick, though in the case of a child with a stupid mother I would make an exception and quarantine them. But if the law in that state is that the animals must be killed, then they must be killed, and those who live there can work to change the law afterwards if they wish.

It'll never happen because of potential liability, but the suggestion to put their pictures and full names in a sign explaining why there are no meerkats in the zoo is a perfect idea. Tag on forcing them to pay for replacements, of course.

As for whether the child knew they'd be killed or not, I don't know, and I don't know which would be worse. I wouldn't be at all surprised if she *was* told; having just been bitten, her love for cute little animals surely wasn't at its peak. On the other hand, if she was the sort who (after having time to calm down and think on it) wouldn't blame them and want revenge, then not being told would hurt her, as she'd surely find out sooner or later that she'd caused their deaths.

As for the dog and neighbor child, the quarantine again makes perfect sense, and I can understand about the psychological evaluation, but not allowing a complaint against the child was inexcusable.

For the bite by your own cat, again, if you want to risk it it should be your option as long as the cat isn't where it could, if sick, get at anyone else in the meantime.

There was at least one more, but that'll have to go in a separate post if I remember what it was and still think it worth bothering about. Good night, y'all.

[Jester]

I still don't understand why the meerkats had to be killed. The family had a choice to get rabies shots or not. The zoo shouldn't be required to "test" for rabies on the meerkats because the shots were turn down.

Sounds to me, the zoo should have just told the family. Hey, it's your choice. I suggest you get that kid rabies shots. Otherwise you won't know until she starts foaming.

I have to point out that the zoo had no choice in this, because they were operating under a state law. Whether or not you agree with the law or think it should be changed, at the time of the incident it still was the law that the zoo was operating under, and so once the girl's mother refused to have the girl get shots, the zoo had no choice but to euthanize the creatures. So I do not take the zoo to task for that.

Nor do I take them to task for the barriers they had up. From the descriptions, they sounded reasonable to me. As has been pointed out, there is no way to idiot-proof anything, and the whole idea of a zoo is get people as close to wild animals as is reasonably possible, so they need to weigh the safety of the people, the safety of the animals, the accessibility/visibility of the animals to the people, and the cost of everything involved when deciding on how to separate man from beast.

I also do not fault the girl. Yes, her actions were stupid and boneheaded. But however bright you may have been when you were 9, or however bright you THOUGHT you were when you were 9, we all made stupid decisions at that age, and more to the point, the law generally does not recognize culpability in people of that age. Legally, in other words, the kid could not be held responsible.

And that brings us to the parents. Let's face it, parents with children get distracted. They can't be there all the time, watching every little thing the kid does, and lord knows there are plenty of distractions at a zoo....oh, hell, who am I kidding? I hold the parents 100% to blame for this whole thing. Because, yes, the above is true, but still, for the child to get that far through so many barriers and the parents not notice or do anything? That is just criminally negligent. (In my personal opinion, which is not in any way a legal opinion.) But you could kind of still see how that could happen to any of us. I sure could. (I don't have kids, but I am an uncle.) So I could still almost give the parents a pass...up to this point. But when the parents refused to allow her child to get the shots, thus causing the extermination of, from all accounts, a happy and friendly meerkat family. (I continually refer to "the parents" because, until I hear otherwise, I am not assuming that it was just the mother present or involved in the decision making process.)

Whether or not the child wanted the shots is irrelevant to this whole discussion, as is the child's selfishness if that were the case. Because there are tons of kids who would not want to get shots, for tons of reasons, even if they knew it would case discomfort or even death to something else. Hey, kids are selfish. I'd like to think that at 9 I would have been different, but I am looking at it with a 27-year hindsight to that age. Regardless of what the child thought about the shots, the parents, were they responsible and moral people, would have forced the child to get those shots, for many reasons already brought up: to avoid the unnecessary death of other living creatures; to teach the child a lesson in there being consequences for one's actions; to punish the child for being so misbehaved and for causing so much trouble and public embarrassment; to teach the child that there are more painful things than being bitten in this world. The parents had a chance to do the right thing, and they dropped the ball. This kind of behavior is the epitome of Sucky Customer behavior: self-entitlement, egotism, arrogance, selfishness, self-indulgence, self-importance, unconcern for others, morally reprehensible behavior that they may not even be aware of.

The parents should be ashamed of their actions, and if there is any amount of good parenting in them, they should take this chance to finally teach their daughter a lesson about all of this, to show her the pain she caused not merely to the meerkats, but to so many other people who work at the zoo, visit the zoo, or are merely aware of this story. Somehow, sadly, I doubt any of that will happen.

I just hope a wild yak escapes from a traveling circus, rampages through these people's house, bites every last one of them, and gives them rabies, typhoid, the clap, malaria, AIDS, diptheria, dysentery, the hunta virus, smallpox, and anything else that is wretchedly painful. Hey, a guy can dream, can't he?

[Broomjockey]

I just hope a wild yak escapes from a traveling circus, rampages through these people's house, bites every last one of them, and gives them rabies, typhoid, the clap, malaria, AIDS, diptheria, dysentery, the hunta virus, smallpox, and anything else that is wretchedly painful. Hey, a guy can dream, can't he?

And LICE!!!


Seriously though. Nice post!

But isn't it hanta virus?

[Jester]

Hunta, hanta, I don't know. Hey, I make one lousy typo, and someone with even more anal tendencies than me is all over it. (Just kidding.)

Anyway, I say, give them both. Hanta and hunta. If there is only one, let's name the next horrible disease discovered the other name, and make sure they get that one too. Just for the bloody heck of it.

[Broomjockey]

Hunta, hanta, I don't know. Hey, I make one lousy typo, and someone with even more anal tendencies than me is all over it.

That's just harsh. Ouchie. *sniff* *sniffie*

And the Oscar goes to.... someone who is NOT ME!!!!

Sorry, I'm gonna be an editor. I try and restrain myself from making corrections while I'm on the boards, but I slipped up. I'm sooorrryyy *sob*

[XCashier]

A brilliant and well-thought out post, Jester! I think you should send it to the editor of the St. Paul Pioneer Press, where the story originated from.

Though if you do, you might want to delete the last paragraph, just to be civil. Then again, I'm sure the idiot woman's neighbors have wished worse things upon her for her stupid actions...

[One-Fang]

Anyway, I say, give them both. Hanta and hunta. If there is only one, let's name the next horrible disease discovered the other name, and make sure they get that one too. Just for the bloody heck of it.

ROFL!!!!

[Jester]

A brilliant and well-thought out post, Jester! I think you should send it to the editor of the St. Paul Pioneer Press, where the story originated from.

Though if you do, you might want to delete the last paragraph, just to be civil. Then again, I'm sure the idiot woman's neighbors have wished worse things upon her for her stupid actions...

Thank you. My mother still has fits that I never went after a job that involved writing....even though I tell her that, in reality, being a magician does entail writing-type talent, for the "scripts" of magic routines that I do. Anyway, not sure if this story was recent enough for me to bother sending this into the newspaper....also, being an Arizonan that lives in Florida, not sure that my opinion would carry much weight with Minnesotans anyway. And as has been pointed out, I can't even spell the hunta/hanta virus correctly!