How relaxing or stress-free is your holiday if you're worrying about your beloved cat or dog languishing in a cage in a cattery or kennels? Is Felix refusing to eat? Is Rover getting kennel cough? Will Sheba remember - or forgive - you? Now rabies is on the decline in the EU, with five cases in 1998 compared with 499 in 1991, a passport for pets scheme allows you to take a pet to certain countries and bring it home without the need for a six-month quarantine.
"The scheme is working very well. It's much less traumatic for animals and their owners," says a veterinary nurse at the Clontarf Veterinary Clinic in Dublin.
Pet owners applying for the "passport" include people with second homes in France or Spain and people who are emigrating with their pets to another European country or Australia, as well as holidaymakers, says a vet at the Animal Welfare Veterinary Hospital in Dublin.
The Pet Travel Scheme (PETS) is not a quick or cheap option, however. "Planning is a problem," says Jenny Macky, a veterinary nurse at the Animal Clinic in Castleknock, Dublin. "People thinking of going on holidays next week come in looking for a pet passport. They don't realise it's such a long wait."
Pets in the Republic operates within the UK scheme, so vaccinated pets have to return here via England. Because it's a lengthy process, you need to first approach your local vet approximately seven months before you plan to return to this country with your pet.
First, the vet inserts a microchip and vaccinates against rabies. A month later, a blood sample is taken and sent to a laboratory approved by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA, formerly the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food) in Britain.
If the blood sample shows positive, a certificate entitling your pet to return to the Republic is automatically issued about six months later. This covers your pet for one year from the vaccination, and the procedure costs between £170 and £220, depending on the sterling exchange rate. Before going abroad, pet owners should also contact the embassy of the relevant country to check their entry requirements
A booster, costing about £35, must be given if you want to travel regularly with your pet.
In addition to the rabies vaccination, you must get a health certificate from a vet, to show your pet is free from infectious disease prior to leaving the Republic. On your way home, a vet must treat your pet for ticks and tapeworm, and issue you with a certificate, between 24 and 48 hours before entering England.
"Pets is going smoothly," says John Costelloe, a vet at the Veterinary Hospital in Ranelagh, Dublin. But he believes the six-month wait is unnecessary for an animal resident in the rabies-free zone of the Republic, the UK or the Channel Islands, as it is highly unlikely the animal had contracted rabies before the jab, and once the blood sample proves positive - that is, the vaccine has "taken" - the animal is immune.
According to DEFRA's PETS helpline, the six-month wait - the rabies incubation period - is to ensure the animal was not infected prior to vaccination. Although it is extremely unlikely that an Irish dog or cat could have rabies, a pet that is resident abroad may have contracted the disease before receiving the jab.
Pets is designed not merely for Irish and British holidaymakers, but for anyone living in the 22 western European countries - and 28 other rabies-free countries covered by the scheme - who wishes to bring their dog or cat to the UK or the Republic. The US is not yet included in the programme, although other long-haul destinations, such as New Zealand, were added recently. DEFRA's website lists the countries covered.
Since February last year, the Department of Agriculture has issued about 200 re-entry certificates for cats and dogs. It had planned to introduce its own PETS, to allow pets to travel directly to the Republic from countries included in the scheme, earlier this year.
"That is still on the cards," says Martina Monaghan of the Department's animal-welfare section, "but it was put on hold when staff and resources were redirected because of foot-and-mouth". It is now expected to be implemented later this year or early in 2002.
DEFRA's website: www.defra.gov.uk/animalh/quarantine/pets/index.shtml; DEFRA helpline: 0044-870-2411710; Passports for Pets group: 0044-208-8705960 or http://freespace.virgin.net/passports.forpets/
Irish quarantine/PETS information: www.irishanimals.com/quarantine/index.html
