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Dangerous wording on letter to congress re: salmonella and reptiles as pets

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Pennebaker

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I dont know how many of you noticed the big red link on all pages of kingsnake that link to a proposition and letter to congress about salmonella and turtles, but...
http://personal.riverusers.com/~richardfife/page20.html

Anyhow, I find the letter that we are all supposed to send to our congressperson to be a little scary in its wording. Here is the quote that I find troublesome:

"The occurrence of Salmonella is frequent in all reptiles sold as pets, yet the FDA has banned only the sale of turtles under a certain size. "

Doesnt this look like a quote promoting banning all reptiles??? To me, this only seems to encourage congress--well if you are going to ban turtles, you better ban all reptiles... and how about some stats as to "frequent" and how "frequent" in reptiles vs other animals.
I wrote the guy who developed this letter (and kingsnake) about possibly changing the wording. If anyone else sees this as troubling as I do, please email the guy and ask him to change that wording.
The last thing I want to do as a reptile keeper is to encourage congress to look at banning all reptiles. And it being posted at the top of KS, I can see a lot of people just signing it without really seeing how it can be interpretted.

Thanks
Dana
 
I do see what you mean. It could potentially be a loop hole for someone trying to ban reptiles as being pets as a whole. I have reptiles and in the time I have had them or the time that I have known people to have them, I have never seen a case of salmonella. I am not saying it doesn't happen just that I believe a lot of people keep themselves, cages and reptiles clean and practice good hygeine.
For activists this could indeed be a great way to get around what the true issue of it is, and twist it around. There are a lot of people who see unban the turtles and sign without realizing the implications of what they are signing
 
Hi, I agree the wording is very dangerous. This Salmonella thing has initiated many of these uneducated Bills in New York State. The latest is the Tonko Bill A07375. Purpose of the Bill and I quote: "To ban the ownership of exotic animals as pets in New York." IMHO terrorists have killed more people in NYC than Salmonella has killed in the entire state since it was a state. So why are these politicians spending so much time and our $$ on this?
Sorry, This stuff drives me crazy!
Listen to this. They have passed a law here: Wild Animal Notification Law 209-cc section "(5) all venomous snakes and all contstrictors and python snakes that are ten feet or greater in lenght:and(6) Crocodilia that are five feet or greater in lenght." (I only mentioned the #'s regarding herps.)
If you own these you must go and register with your village or town hall in order to protect firemen and emergency service personnell. "The States Fire Administrator in consultation with the Dept of Evironmental Conservation, shall develop and maintain a list of the common names of wild animals to be reported."
I don't own a snake that will make it to ten feet? but I'm still concerned about this law. If the Tonka Bill passes they will already have names of people that will be violating this law and then they can make them surrender their animals for euthanasia. Then after that's done what do ya bet they'll go after the rest? Very Scary. The Tonka Bill was initiated by PETA and HSUS. The first is not surprising but HSUS? WOW. IMO, I love THE US, I was in the Army 6 years, but if every state outlaws HERPS I'm outta here! And when we all leave, then the lawyers and politicians can pick up a gun and defend this Great Country. I bet they'll forget about the dangerous wild animals then.LOL.
Sorry this is so long but everyone in every state should be abreast of the bills in their states regulating herps and be prepared to fight against and not VOTE for these people.
Thanks, Rob
 
Just wanted to say I agree. I read the letter and decided that I could not send it out because of the way it was written. I too felt that it could be cause for banning all reptiles.
 
Looks like the Kaplanites are truly taking over at KS. What ever happened to their link about the CDC's stance on Salmonella? I was looking for the info they posted last year (or year before??) in opposition to the HSUS smear campaign last night, and came up with zip.

I tried the Animal Issues page and found nothing but crap.

Now we have this garbage? That statement is utter crap. Some aquatic turtles may be prone to being salmonella carriers, and they may even require some salmonella in their systems. Sure. But "frequent" in "all reptiles"?

This is STUPID. First, not all reptiles can carry salmonella asymptomatically. Second, I've NEVER read about any reptile related salmonella cases outside of an incident at a zoo and the odd case of some idiot allowing free range reptiles (usually iguanas) in their house. The reptile salmonella risk is WAY overblown.

Bottom line, cats can carry THREE types of salmonella and quite a few other zoonotic diseases, including some that are fatal to healthy, adult humans, which salmonella seldom is.

But cats are everywhere.

I guess that the Kaplanites have pulled any teeth that KS had in regards to helping us protect our hobby.

And maybe the idiot who wrote that letter should stick to using the word "turtles" instead of making blanket statements.
 
According to the CDC you can get salmonella from goldfish. Uh oh! I wonder if they'll try to ban those too. No, of course not, they're not reptiles. :angry:

Erin B.

Who firmly believes snakeheads (Channa) wouldn't have gotten so much attention if they were called puppyheads.
 
I was forwarded the letter and asked to send it to my congressman. I simply replied back to the person who sent it stating that I will in no way take part in the distribution of this letter as it is a danger to the entire reptile keeping hobby.

Cases of reptile-related salmonella in humans are very few and far between, however, when a child does get sick, it is plastered all over the news. But that's ok, because when you pick it up from undercooked chicken or eggs, it's not newsworthy. Nobody gets frightened when they see a bucket of fried chicken. I believe that if you are going to point out that all reptiles carry salmonella(which they do), then you need to also point out the fact that birds, dogs, cats, ferrets, rabbits, and just about EVERY other animal can carry it as well.

I strongly urge people NOT to sign or forward this petition to ANYONE. It appears to me as a poorly worded subterfuge by the reptile ban supporters to sneak their way into getting hte reptile community to back their agenda.
 
OOPS!!!!
That was actually a quote from the proposal, not from the letter. The guy wrote me back--there are quotes around that section. I guess it was not clear.
Sorry guys.
Dana
 
I felt the same way about that quote. When I sent the letter to our state assemblymen, I changed it. It originallly said, "The occurrence of Salmonella is frequent in all reptiles sold as pets and many foods , yet the FDA has banned only the sale of turtles under a certain size. " I added the part in red.

Tony Alles
www.reptileguru.com
 
I'd change it to include "all animals," no mention of "all reptiles."

Maybe even include a line calling out cats specifically using what BrianB stated in this thread. Just to drive the point home that its not just "all reptiles" we should be worried about.
 
That is exactly the problem with the letter. It does not include reference to cats, dogs, goldfish, or the myriad other animals that can and DO carry salmonella. ONLY reptiles are included. I contacted Richard at Riparian Farms, who is the one that supposedly wrote it to voice my concerns about the wording of the letter, but also to let him know I DO agree with a revision to the 4-inch law, which to me has always been absurd.

However, this letter seems to be fairly shortsighted and not so well-conceived. The intent seems honorable after reading it over a few more times, but the execution in my opinion, poor.
 
It seems that the letter kingsnake is promoting is doing 2 things-


1- asking for the ratification of a proposal that is now on the table.
2- asking for the removal of the 4inch turtle rule



We have to send a letter that supports 2 but calls for a modification of proposal 1. We can't simply modify the wording of the quoted text. We have to include our own protest of the wording as well.
 
Here's one for congress and the salmonella cause
I have been keeping herps for many years ...cought the bug once...not from the herps....but from a grocery store down in Florida[ one of the bigger chains]
But I guess the meet deli person had some reptiles at his house''''YEAH RIGHT!!!!!!!!
 
I just wanted to let everyone know I received what appears to be an automated response from Richard at Riparian Farms, who is supposedly the author of the letter/proposal.

This response was rather vague and mainly just repeated what the initial letter said in the first place. None of my concerns and those of others about the letter was addressed. I wrote back explaining this and hopefully I will get a "live" response from Richard regarding why only reptiles were mentioned.

In the response, it states that the FDA is aware that ALL reptiles can carry salmonella, but that only small turtles are being singled out. However, by his statements, HE is guilty of the same. Out of ALL the animals we have around us and in our homes and on our dinner plates, he is singling out REPTILES.

After receiving the automated response along with another e-mail from Richard containing the SAME letter for me to forward/sign, I feel that this person does not particularly care what the rest of the community thinks of his actions in this instance. Automated responses do not address concerns. A vague response and another copy of the same letter I was opposing shows he didn't even bother to read what I had to say(which was that I will NOT sign/forward the letter in its present form).

I also asked about this 100% salmonella free technology he speaks of for turtles and tortoises. I have never heard of this and to my understanding, any and ALL reptiles have the potential and often times DO carry it despite what we do.
 
Some Info

Here's the info blurb that KS used to have up, from the NRAAC site:

http://www.nraac.org/salmonella.html

Here's more than you ever wanted to know about

salmonella:http://www.salmonella.org

If anyone's interested in writing Congress, these are better places to look for facts than the turtle guy's site. (No offense to turtle keepers out there, I just can't remember the guy's name =)
 
This cracks me up... One site stated that there are approximately 93000 cases of reptile-related salmonellosis per year in the US...but the CDC site states there are approximately 40,000 cases of salmonellosis in the US. That's all forms and sources.

Uh, someone must be doing that "new math"....


http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/diseaseinfo/salmonellosis_g.htm#How common is salmonellosis
 
The quote in question does not worry me. I don’t think its inclusion in the letter in question will effect anything more or less because that quote comes from the wording of the House Joint resolution.

What does worry me is the following quote from that same letter:

The FDA should not prohibit the sale of baby turtles arbitrarily, and particularly due to the availability of 100% Salmonella free turtles.
Click to expand...

If Congress does decide to repeal the old law, thereby allowing sub four inch turtles to be become commercially available legally, don’t you think there will be a catch. I do. I think the turtles will be required to be certified as Salmonella free. If that becomes the case, it will require bureaucracy to accomplish the certification. The FDA will likely have to inspect turtles to assure they are Salmonella free. This will come with a price, and the price of the turtles will skyrocket.

Of course, since I work for the government, I can expect no less a foul up than this, but I can certainly envision more of a screw up. You see, the letter also has another choice sentence within it, allow me to quote that letter once again:

It is expected that these same procedures can be used to eliminate the risk of Salmonella in all pet reptiles.
Click to expand...

So if they pass such legislation, why not just add on a bit about requiring all pet reptiles to be certified as 100% Salmonella free?

To me, this letter’s wording does sound very similar to the writings of a certain person who works various herp related websites, who in my opinion, is a misguided anti Salmonella, and possibly anti herp ownership, kind of a person. While I do not know the writing style of the person who claimed to have written this letter, I wonder if the fellow who wrote this had any help from a person, who in my opinion, seems to display the attitude of: ‘I have gotta be in control of herpdom and fellow herpers because I alone know better than all of them”? This letter, as written, is potential dynamite in that it may blow up the whole darned hobby and leave little but rubble and dust.

Best regards,
Glenn Bartley
 
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