OITA -- A local police officer passed away in January this year after a 17-year battle with health complications stemming from a ferret bite sustained on duty in 2002, the Oita Prefectural Police told the Mainichi Shimbun.

His death was recognized as work-related by the Fund for Local Government Employees' Accident Compensation this past July.

According to the prefectural police, the assistant inspector was posted to a police box in front of JR Oita Station early on the morning of June 26, 2002 when he was called out on an emergency report of a ferret on the loose in a nearby park. The animal bit him on the hand as he was trying to capture it. Three months later, he developed cellulitis, a bacterial infection of the deep skin tissue that can spread to the lymph nodes and bloodstream. He was in and out of hospital thereafter, until his death on Jan. 18 in a medical facility in Beppu, Oita Prefecture, western Japan.

The officer's family applied for support from the local government employee compensation fund, which concluded on July 26 that his cause of death was related to the ferret bite and confirmed the incident as an accident in the line of duty.

Ferrets are predatory mammals that usually grow to 30 to 50 centimeters in length, and are popular as pets.

"Just as with stray cats, a bite from a stray ferret can lead to harmful bacteria entering the body," warned 61-year-old Hisashi Saeki, a veterinarian and head of the Oita Dobutsu Aigo Center, an animal welfare facility in the city of Oita. The prefectural police say that there is no record of whether the ferret that bit the officer was feral. It is also unknown whether the animal was ever captured.

(Japanese original by Arina Ogata, Oita Bureau)