What do I have in common with Nicola Peltz Beckham? She’s a rich, attractive twenty-something model, actress, and heiress married to Brooklyn Beckham, and I’m… well, none of those things.
And yet, looking at an Instagram post of Nicola kissing her Chihuahua Nala, I realise that we are, in fact, soul sisters – and that we both have no fear of the 600 or so species of bacteria and other microorganisms that live in dogs’ mouths.
I kiss my dogs too. In fact, I greet the morning every day with a ritual of kissing, nibbling and licking ears, necks and faces. No, I obviously don’t lick my two dogs, but I do give them a kiss on the top of their heads. But dogs show their affection by licking and I appreciate their canine kisses.
I adore my dogs. We coexist so closely that I sometimes forget I have two legs. Those 20 minutes or so I spend lying naked in bed catching up on the day’s news while spooning my Spanish hunting dogs is a small joy I will never give up.
Peltz Beckham’s post, however, divided the internet. Describing Nala’s death after her dog groomer “violently mistreated and/or intentionally abused” her (according to a lawsuit), she chose a photo of the tiny pup licking her owner’s perfect pout.
Kate Spicer says she kisses her dogs every day because she loves her dogs
She says she has no fear of the approximately 600 species of bacteria and other microorganisms that live in dogs’ mouths.
“Poor Nicola!” was my immediate reaction, but not everyone was sending thoughts and prayers to Peltz Beckham in his grief. Some could only see the unhealthy potential of canine saliva. A storm broke out on social media.
Who is right, then? People like my ten-year-old goddaughter’s grandparents, who are prepared with hand gel just in case she pets my dogs? Or me, who judges this level of dog phobia harshly?
I consulted several experts, all of them teachers, to see whether it is better to run away from a slobbering dog or run to return the slobbering dog.
Professor Luca Guardabassi and Associate Professor Peter Damborg from the Department of Veterinary and Animal Sciences at the University of Copenhagen are veterinary microbiologists whose speciality is bacterial diseases transmitted by domestic animals. How bad are dogs? I ask them.
The good news is that our canine friends cannot be blamed for spreading bubonic plague (lice and fleas) or malaria (mosquitoes).
But these two world-respected experts point out that dogs can transmit “parasites, viruses and fungi” (ringworm being the most common).
The problem here, of course, is my sleeping companions’ penchant for licking each other’s butts and rolling in the excrement of other species.
Although I wash them thoroughly with water after these horrible episodes, the fact is that my dogs are animals. When you start counting the ways they rebel, you can keep going for quite a while.
Nicola Peltz Beckham kisses her chihuahua Nala in an Instagram post that divided the internet
Kate is “proud” to be a “dog kisser” despite experts saying dogs can transmit “parasites, viruses and fungi” (ringworm being the most common)
The good old butt-licking is a “common pathway by which enteric pathogens, including E. coli, Salmonella and Campylobacter, can be spread,” the professors continue.
One of the most dangerous is leptospira, also known as Weil’s disease. Panicking, I look at the data and discover that an average of fewer than 40 cases of leptospirosis are reported each year and that since 1996 there have been only four deaths. The panic is over.
Still, when it comes to kissing a dog, both of them refuse. “It wouldn’t be a drama, but we’d probably wash our faces.”
When it comes to co-sleeping, scientists are divided. Guardabassi says: “Not in my bed, because I like a clean bed without dog poop or hair. At most, I can accept a cat sleeping in it.”
Damborg says, “Yes, because the risk of transmission is likely low, and you have to weigh the benefit to psychological well-being of being around your pet against a small risk.” After my brief moment of germophobia passed, I was reminded of an inspiring, science-backed talk about how our pet dogs positively influence human health. It was given by neuroscientist Tommy Wood, a popular speaker at “health optimization” conferences.
I reach out to Wood, an associate professor at Washington University School of Medicine. Does he kiss his two dogs (a pit bull-boxer mix and a boxer)? “They lick my face and sometimes they lick my mouth… Unless you’re very young, very old or have a compromised immune system, I’d say the risk is minimal.”
And she adds a note of caution: “Consider exposure to dog mouths as you would be exposed to human mouths. Most people don’t go around kissing other humans they don’t know, and it’s best to take a similarly cautious approach with unfamiliar dogs.”
Then I come across the ultimate defense of a dog lick or two. Something called the “old friends hypothesis” holds that humans evolved with the animals and livestock in our immediate environment, and that we are not only able to tolerate dog licks, but actually depend on doses of their microbes for our robust survival.
“Everyone alive today probably had ancestors in tribes that hunted with dogs,” says Jack Gilbert, director of the Center for Microbiome and Metagenomics at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine.
“Our immune system evolved and was selected for the presence of dogs and their bacteria,” meaning that “exposure to dogs and their bacteria is beneficial for the development of the immune system.”
Hooray! Our pets are a kind of vaccine against the most common pathogens! Or at least that’s the lesson I’m drawing from it. I agree with Peltz Beckham. I’m a dog kisser and proud of it.
(tags to translate)dailymail