Quarantine of Animals

Animal quarantine is an important process to segregate, isolate and determine the health and presence of adventitious agents in a population of animals. At FAU animals may be quarantined for a number of reasons including (but not limited to): Importation, transfer between campuses, treatment of contagious disease, and containment of a disease outbreak.

Rodent quarantine is handled by Comparative Medicine. Animals entering quarantine have restricted access to Comparative Medicine personnel only. No experimental procedures or breeding is allowed while animals are in quarantine as this increases the potential risk for disease transmission. The most common quarantine is due to importation of animals from non-approved vendors. Non-approved vendors typically include other academic or research institutions. These facilities often have health monitoring programs that are not as comprehensive as our approved vendors (see at https://www.fau.edu/research-admin/comparative-medicine/approved-vendors/ ).

Upon arrival into a FAU vivarium, the health of the animals are assessed by Comparative Medicine personnel and then the animals undergo a period of acclimatization prior to testing for excluded rodent pathogens. Animals testing negative for ALL excluded pathogens (see exclusion list by species and location at https://www.fau.edu/research-admin/comparative-medicine/animal-health-surveillance/ ) are then released to the general colony. The duration of quarantine is 3-8 weeks and is dependent upon: the source of the shipment (domestic versus international); the health reports from the shipping institution; the type of testing required for the shipment. On the average, expect international shipments to take 6-8 weeks and domestic to take 3 weeks.