Will Falconer, DVM Moderator
This area isn't the one to worry about, at least for now, Esther. It's a rare circumstance that a domestic animal gets bitten by a rabid animal, and the ways of the disease are such that rabies incubation in the bitten animal varies like crazy, up to months. Hence the long quarantine, to be sure the bitten animal doesn't get rabies and then pass it on further.
We need to stay focused on lessening the vaccination repetition requirements, which is much more clear: there's no good that comes of it (no further immunity in an already immune animal) and there's significant harm possible, as Tigger and the many other animal reports in these comments clearly demonstrate. The data on duration of immunity will help these laws to change, and our efforts in this arena will save a lot of unnecessary suffering.