My next door neighbor has tested positive for Covid. She lives alone with her dog. My wife or I walk her dog several times a week when she is at work and one of us is home. Heck I went into her house and walked her dog Tuesday, the day before she was diagnosed. The dog is friendly and shy.
My neighbor is in her fifties and has asthma. She has been home since being diagnosed. She phoned this morning in a panic saying she thinks she is going to have to go to the hospital.
What is the right thing to do? I say take the dog in if she is hospitalized. What else can we do? The dog is probably not carrying any Covid on him, right?
We do not know all there is to know about this virus. Personally…I’d be wary of a pet ferret, maybe even a pet cat. A dog could act as a fomite, so I’d house the dog outdoors or in a garage foe a few hours, but then feel ok about housing the dog inside. Certainly safer than entering her home to feed/care for the dog.
Sounds like a good plan. My wife and I both work in the grocery business and encounter hundreds of folks every day. We are always masked up at work, and try our best to limit contacts elsewhere.
I would think the biggest risk would be that the fur would have virus particles from droplets that landed on it or from places the dog was laying on and picked it up. Petting or touching the dog could transfer that virus to your hands and other surfaces. I would guess that washing the dog thoroughly outside before bringing it home would be sufficient to neutralize any of the virus.
Right now her doctors talked to my neighbor, calmed her, and she is not going to the hospital at this time. She is currently well enough to take her dog outside to the bathroom so we will see how that goes day to day.
We volunteered to take in her dog so she would not have to take him out, but that dog is Andrea’s only companion. Her husband left her last fall.