Cats as goats…?

In the UK news this week, there was an article stating that two people in a localised area have been recorded as contracting Bovine Tuberculosis from their cats. The people are responding well to treatment for the infection.

What strikes me as odd about this is the timing. In the last year or so in the UK there have been badger culls put in place to “control the spread of Bovine TB.” Ironically, despite the scientific proof indicating the culls would do no such thing and a pilot of the scheme being an unmitigated failure, the culls are still scheduled to continue.

So on reading this article, my first thought went to the feral and stray cat population. Are they at risk from a similar process and how many cats in homes are likely to be surrendered to rescue based on this recent publication?

Feral and stray cats, as mentioned in a previous blog, are already the demographic of the feline population predominantly overlooked or vilified. Ferals and strays don’t conform to the ideology people have of cats, because they aren’t given the appropriate care to aid curbing their instincts. So, they’d be an easy scapegoat for anyone in charge of decision making to label as part of the problem.

Clearly, as someone who is a massive fan of cats this is of rather a concern to me. So I urge people to look into the actual level of risk regarding the likelihood of anyone catching Bovine TB from a feline family member, or in fact, any cat…it’s actually miniscule, and no amount of tabloid sensationalism is going to alter that fact.