Headline writers have had a lot of fun over the past few years writing about toxoplasmosis and potential associations with neurological and behavioural disorders in people. Cats are the main natural host of Toxoplasma gondii, so “crazy cat lady” and other predictable headlines have ensued.
But, what is the real risk?
The answer is
I had an interesting question today about the cat-associated parasite Toxoplasma gondii. It can cause serious infection in people that ingest it, particularly in immunocompromised individuals and pregnant women, but disease is rare. Since cats can pass one form of the parasite in their feces, the question was whether using flushable kitty litter is
I grew up with cats, and they were all indoor/outdoor. I never really thought about it since that was just the way things were done. Yet, as much as he’d like to convince us otherwise, our current cat Finnegan is an indoor cat. There are a lot of reasons for this.
One reason for keeping
I love my cats. But sometimes when Bonnie and Clyde are living up to their names, puking up hair balls twice a day, peeing on the guest bed (yes, contrary to popular belief even vets can’t stop their own cats from doing this sometimes), caterwauling at 3 AM, or begging for food all afternoon, they
A recent column by pediatrician Dr. T. Berry Brazelton has caused quite a stir. Dr. Brazleton is apparently a very well known syndicated columnist, and he answered a question from a reader about her pregnant daughter and her cats. The reader was concerned about the cats lying on the baby. However, Dr. Brazleton focused
You may notice a recurring theme in many of our posts and on virtually all of the information sheets on the Worms & Germs Resources page: an emphasis on handwashing. There is increasing emphasis on hand hygiene (i.e. hand washing and use of alcohol hand sanitizers) education in hospitals because the hands of healthcare
If you are looking for an interesting website to play around with, you should try HealthMap. This is a website created by the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology that maps infectious disease reports from various sources. You can search by region and see what disease problems have been reported recently, or select
Everyone is familiar with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) – the retrovirus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) in people. Although HIV can only infect humans and some primates, cats can be infected by a very similar virus from the same genus (Lentivirus) with a similar name – feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV). The
There is a degree of risk of disease transmission from any contact with an animal, just as there is from any contact with another person. Some of the diseases involved are minor or even insignificant, while others are potentially devastating. And the risk can change in certain situations, such as pregnancy. A developing fetus is
Toxoplasma gondii is one of the most widespread zoonotic pathogens in the world. Toxoplasma is a protozoal parasite that can infect almost any warm-blooded animal, including humans. In most people and animals, infection doesn’t cause any illness at all, and after the initial infection, the body usually produces strong immunity which protects it from subsequent
