H5N1 in Farm Animals is One Thing- When it Threatens My Pet...
House cat mortality adds new dynamics and urgency to discussions regarding increased surveillance in farm animals and products
In my weekend post I made a somewhat facetious reference to upset “cat ladies”, a recent political land-mine in U.S. presidential politics. It didn’t take 24 hours for an article to appear in Scientific American laying out the current threat that H5N1 poses to the U.S. feline population:
Bird Flu Is Infecting Pet Cats. Here’s What You Need to Know | Scientific American
I suspect that Colorado, where 6 feline deaths were recently documented, has a much higher environmental load of H5N1 than in the rest of the U.S. in general. However, we don’t have anywhere close to adequate surveillance in cattle, or in cats for that matter, to accurately assess risks across the balance of the nation.
One of the articles (link) I referenced this morning a farmer referred to utilizing sick farm cats as sentinels for possible developing H5N1 in his dairy herd in lieu of testing: …Another exhibitor said he relies on barn cats as an early warning system. Healthy cats mean cows aren’t sick. Cats on some infected farms have died in the outbreak.
A question out there is how many farm cats, ranging from pets to feral, are succumbing to H5N1 while drinking milk residues at incubating dairy farms? How many mice and other rodents are picking up virus on farms for potential spread to off-farm locations (how far?) with onward viral transmission to cats or other mammals? How many birds are either mechanically carrying viral residues or actually being infected with HPAI H5N1, threatening avian replication and re-transmission?
These are the critical issues we face in not knowing where this virus is and to what degree it is found in our dairy herds, possibly in beef herds, and in our surrounding environments. Cats are a very visible sentinel species. They are also valued pets and family members for countless households. We minimize the risks they face at our peril.
John