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| Anton the polar bear in happier days. |
This weekend the story
about the Great Dane that had 43.5 socks removed from its gastrointestinal
tract has gone nuts all over the net, but foreign bodies (or FBs as they are
known in the biz – things that get inside animals or people that shouldn’t be
there) are not just a dog thing. They’re really common in all kinds of animals
and usually spell trouble. Birds swallow objects containing lead and zinc which
lead to heavy metal toxicity, cats can eat string which can wreak havoc on the
gut, and even animals in zoos will ingest things that fall into their
enclosures.
Earlier this year I
reported on the death of Anton, a polar bear at Wilhelma Zoo, who died due to
complications from an intestinal foreign body. Someone dropped something into
the enclosure. It wasn’t the first time.
Despite major efforts by the zoo,
including an electric fence around the enclosure, a number of objects had
fallen into the enclosure over the past 20 years. These include, according to
the zoo, about 200 children’s shoes,
around 50 baby’s dummies per year, hats, cameras, mobile phones and spectacles.
The sorts of items one (or one’s offspring) might drop when leaning over to get
a better look at an animal.
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| Just some of the foreign material recovered from Anton's gastrointestinal tract. |
But sometime
in January, someone dropped a backpack and a jacket in there (you’d think you’d
notice your bag was missing at least) and weeks later Anton succumbed to
peritonitis secondary to a linear foreign body. When you do visit zoos and
wildlife parks, remember the sign “do not feed the animals” also means “don’t
drop inanimate objects into the enclosure” as these can be subject to oral
investigation.
FREE course on epidemics
& infectious diseases
If you’re interested in
infectious diseases, zoonoses and public health, Coursera is offering a free
course on “Epidemics: the dynamics of infectious diseases” from September 29,
taught by academics from the University of Pennsylvania.
