Dog owners worried after fake report of Alabama rot case in North Yorkshire

A reported case of the deadly canine disease Alabama rot in North Yorkshire appears to be a social media scam.

Dog worriers began worriedly sharing a Facebook post last week which suggested a dog had caught the rare illness in the village of Osmotherley, near Northallerton.

However, the case has not been officially verified and the post is now believed to have been fake.

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National veterinary chain Vets4Pets has an online map of Alabama rot cases, which records the only confirmed case of the disease in North Yorkshire to have been in the Ripon area back in 2014.

Owners of dogs in the Redcar area of Cleveland have also claimed their animals have been infected in the last few weeks, although these cases have not been verified by Vets4Pets.

One woman said that one of her dogs died after a 14-day battle with the disease and her other pet is still being treated for it. The source of the infection is thought to be Errington Woods, near New Marske.

A vet surgery in Guiseley, near Leeds, announced that they had treated a dog with the illness in December 2017. In the same month there was a confirmed case in the village of Sacriston, near Durham.

Around 120 dogs have been diagnosed with the condition since Alabama rot was first recorded in Britain in 2012. It is fatal in around 30 per cent of cases.