http://www.twincities.com/mld/pioneerpress/news/local/states/wisconsin/9340329.htm?1c
States probe illegal sales of pet turtles
Salmonella risk led to ban in the 1970s
Posted on Sat, Aug. 07, 2004
Published in St.Paul Pioneer Press 8/7/04
BY MARILYNN MARCHIONE
Ap Medical Writer
MILWAUKEE — Wisconsin and several other states are moving to stop a recent surge in the illegal sale of pet turtles, banned since the 1970s because of the risk of serious salmonella infections they pose, especially to young children.
The turtles, most often a variety called red-eared sliders, have turned up in recent months at malls and gift shops in popular vacation spots in Wisconsin, Arizona, Kansas, South Carolina and Texas.
U.S. Food and Drug Administration spokesman Brad Stone said the agency was looking into the matter. In December, the agency warned against sales of baby turtles that were occurring in a Houston mall.
Wisconsin officials said Friday they had taken action against shops in a half dozen locations around the state and were working with federal officials to find the distributors, who are believed to be from several southern states.
Turtles were being sold in Oneida, Vilas, Sawyer and Columbia counties, including four or five stores in the Wisconsin Dells area.
"We think it could be in more than four counties," said state epidemiologist Dr. Jeffrey Davis.
The problem came to light after a 4-year-old Kansas girl was sickened with salmonella bacteria that officials think she got from three turtles her mother bought while recently vacationing in Wisconsin.
As many as 250,000 reptile-related salmonella infection cases occurred each year in the United States until the FDA banned selling turtles with shells shorter than 4 inches in 1975. Salmonella infection causes fever, diarrhea, cramps and vomiting, and can lead to miscarriages and bloodstream infections that occasionally prove fatal, especially to infants and the elderly.
Snakes, iguanas and other reptiles also cause such infections. About 80,000 cases are reported each year, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Victims often haven't even had direct contact with the animal — infections can spread through carpet droppings, contact with adults who handled the pet or by babies or dishes washed in the same sink as an animal's dish was.
The CDC recommends people don't keep reptiles as pets in homes with children under 1 year of age, and children under 5 and people with weak immune systems avoid contact with them.
In Wisconsin, some stores were trying to skirt the ban on sales by giving free turtles to customers who bought a tank and food.
"The FDA regulation is very clear that you can neither sell nor distribute, so the giveaways are also in violation," said James Kazmierczak, the state's public health veterinarian.
Most Wisconsin stores had complied with health officials' requests to destroy the turtles humanely and to stop selling them, but one was resisting and was being threatened with citations for each day the violations continue, Kazmierczak said.
ON THE NET
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: http://www.cdc.gov
Reptile-associated salmonellosis: http://dhfs.wisconsin.gov /dph—bcd/communicable/factsheets/ReptileSal mo.htm
