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By Chris Brown

Are your pet vaccinations up to date?

Be aware of kennel cough in dry winter air

Jan 15, 2021 | 3:28 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – Calgary veterinarians are seeing an increase in kennel cough the past year and a Medicine Hat clinic wants to make sure it doesn’t become a problem locally.

Tammy Duggan of Cypress View Veterinary Clinic says kennel cough is a very contagious airborne virus that causes an upper respiratory infection.

“So if a dog in the vicinity of another dog coughs and your dog breathes it in, there’s a chance that it will get kennel cough if it hasn’t been vaccinated against it,” she says. “So it is something you want to be very aware of. It’s not as deadly as some of the viruses that can be out there but it is very annoying and if a dog has it, nobody sleeps for a couple of days at least. It’s a cough that happens all night.”

In the worst cases, kennel cough can spread to the lungs potentially cause pneumonia.

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Duggan says they don’t often recommend “Dr. Google” but in this case, there are some really great videos online that show what a kennel cough sounds like.

“It’s kind of a honking sound but that said from there they should always contact the veterinarian just to see because they certainly are other causes for pets to cough so check out the sound, your dog very well might have kennel cough and then if it goes any further of course contact the veterinarian.”

She says one way to help soothe your dog if they do have kennel cough is to simply increase the humidity in your home.

“Turn on the shower, get a lot of humidity going on in that bathroom and let him hang out in there for a while,” Duggan says.

Duggan adds if there’s any chance your dog does have kennel cough, keep them away from other dogs.

She said the dry winter air could be a contributor to the rising cases of kennel coughs elsewhere, and missing vet visits could be another.

“I know early on in COVID we stopped doing anything but very essential things,” she says. “We’ve since discovered we’ve come up with new protocols on being able to let the pets in, we don’t let their owners in but the pets can come in, they get vaccinated and treated, all the things that need to be done. So there probably are quite a few pets out there that are past due on their vaccinations.”