Family dogs caught up in the Japan earthquake of 2011 and
subsequent nuclear disaster at Fukushima showed signs of stress
not inconsistent with PTSD long after the events, a new study
finds. The research compared abandoned dogs rescued from
Fukushima with non-disaster affected dogs abandoned in 2009 and
2010, before the earthquake. The dogs that lived through the
disaster had stress hormone levels five to 10 times higher than
the dogs that were simply abandoned or found as strays. "Long-
term care and concern regarding the psychological impact of
disasters appears necessary in humans and companion animals,"
the researchers wrote today (Oct. 11) in the journal Scientific
Reports. As part of a dog-rehabilitation program at Azabu
University in Japan, researchers took in eight dogs from
shelters in Kanagawa Prefecture and measured their levels of
physical stress by monitoring the stress hormone cortisol in the
dogs' urine. After the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami,
thousands of refugees were forced to abandon t