But rabies is not the terror that it was thanks to improved treatment

But rabies is not the terror that it was, thanks to improved treatment. More significantly, new and more effective vaccine for rabies, so-called "inactivated vaccine", has been compulsorily in use since 1971, which means that, although in Europe rabies is still found in foxes and some other animals in the wild, domestic animals have long been free of it.Thanks to these advances, other countries proud of their rabies-free status, such as Sweden, have felt able to drop quarantine in favour of a passport system, whereby pet owners carry identity documents bearing vaccination details, coupled with a microchip implanted in the animal which allows its identity to be verified.In Britain, not a single scientifically proven case of rabies has occurred in any imported animal since compulsory vaccination of pet and zoo animals was introduced in 1971. "I truly believe Sadie died from stress," Eileen says.Every year, 10,000 owners travelling to Britain go through the agony of seeing their pets incarcerated in kennels, all approved by Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries, that are at best sterile model prisons and at worst stinking animal concentration camps, where large dogs are penned in small cages and for months on end never see the light of day It is a pounds 10m-a-year trade. Dozens of pets die in quarantine every year; many more fall ill, or die not long afterwards.All this suffering is justified by the Government on the grounds of keeping Britain free of rabies, as it has been for more than 70 years. Lock a cat or dog up for six months, and at the end, it is unwell."Eileen and Patrick visited the kennel twice a week, but half-way through the period, on 21 June, they got a call to say that Sadie was ill The next day, she died The autopsy revealed that she had suffered liver failure. I got back to the bus stop, and I just cried." In the end, she plumped for a kennel that the family had used before without a problem. "They let us take in Sadie's favourite toys and blankets, the sort of thing other kennels won't allow."But, as a London vet points out, "cats and dogs obviously suffer in quarantine, and it doesn't matter how luxurious the surroundings.

"Big dogs, crammed into tiny cages, hurled themselves at me as I walked past There was one kennel maid doing the work of half a dozen The dogs were going out of their minds. But her California-based owners, Eileen and Patrick Thompson, loved her and her son Winston (father unknown). And when they decided, on Patrick's retirement from the American military, to move back to Britain, they resolved that, despite the nightmare of six months' quarantine, Sadie and Winston would have to come too. To the Thompsons' great distress, Sadie didn't make it through the nightmare. Eileen was careful to choose a quarantine kennel with plenty of space and high standards: she visited one, in north London, where the stink of animal excreta hit her before she got through the front door. Why did Sadie have to die? She was an 11-year-old mongrel, the outcome of an unlikely liaison between a German Shepherd and a Spanish chihuahua. In fact, long before Fred McLeod, the Scottish rugby Union president, took the microphone after the match and spoke movingly of the rugby community's desire to show it cared, events passed off smoothly and tastefully in a spectacle of running rugby.Nothing should be read into a result when both teams willingly eschewed kickable penalties to put an emphasis on spreading the ball wide.

The only big marketing initiative, put forward by the federation's marketing director Barry Snellgrove, has been a doomed and misguided attempt to re-establish betting at athletics venues.The odds are that today's meeting at Gateshead will offer better entertainment than Crystal Palace: Linford Christie against Donovan Bailey has the unmistakable feel of a real athletic contest.Let's hope, for everyone's sake, that it does not turn out to be an isolated example.. British athletics had to become more self-reliant.Three years on, it is as dependent on television money as ever; and there is less of that about. When the group led by the present executive chairman, Peter Radford, took over the running of the federation in 1993, there was much talk of moving away from dependence on television revenue to sustain the sport. If the contract is renegotiated, it may be at a reduced rate.The federation are already talking about reducing the number of domestic events. Britain's leading athletes, for instance, have been obliged to follow the Olympics with three domestic meetings in the space of two weeks - at Gateshead today and Sheffield on Sunday Bonkers.Less could mean more in terms of quality But the federation is involved in a vicious circle.