Does My Dog Have Cat Flu?
If your pup shows any of the signs of cat flu (parvovirus), take him to your vet immediately, especially if your dog is under one year old! This virus can be a serious health threat to any dog.
Symptoms At first, your pooch may just act a bit under the weather after contracting parvovirus, staying away from food and acting less playful than usual. Once the virus starts to do its thing, your dog will likely start to vomit or have bad diarrhea. Dehydration starts to set in fast, which is another reason to get your fur-baby treated quickly.
Causes Puppies who have not had their shots have the highest risk of getting cat flu. If your dog gets into any animal poop or if he goes nose to nose with an infected animal, the virus can easily spread to him. Dogs who are under stress also seem to get this virus more often than those who are stress-free.
Diagnosis Parvovirus is very easy to diagnose! Your vet will need a sample of your dogs blood to send to a lab for evaluation. They will likely be able to determine if the dog has produced antibodies that match cat flu from its blood.
If youre looking for more info about diagnosing parvovirus in your dog, give this article a read: Parvo in Dogs.
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What to do if your cat has the flu
Again, take your cat to the veterinarian right away. Especially since the flu virus has a track record of killing cats.
Between 2009 to 2011, the American Veterinary Medical Association reported 12 cases of cats infected with the flu virus, five of whom died. In all those cases, the cat contracted the virus either from an infected human or an infected cat. For example, in 2009, a cat in Oregon died of H1N1 flu complications after its owner was hospitalized with the same strain of the flu.
Moreover, the veterinarian can diagnose whether this is the flu, feline herpes virus-1, or another condition, which will determine the best method of treatment. Likewise, let your vet know youre coming since they will probably want to isolate the cat from other patients to prevent further infection.
Can Dogs Get Cat Flu? | Wag!
Influenza A viruses are amongst the most challenging viruses that threaten both human and animal health. Constantly evolving and crossing species barrier, the emergence of novel zoonotic pathogens is one of the greatest challenges to global health security. During the last decade, considerable attention has been paid to influenza virus infections in dogs, as two canine H3N8 and H3N2 subtypes caused several outbreaks through the United States and Southern Asia, becoming endemic. Cats, even though less documented in the literature, still appear to be susceptible to many avian influenza infections. While influenza epidemics pose a threat to canine and feline health, the risks to humans are largely unknown. Here, we review most recent knowledge of the epidemiology of influenza A viruses in dogs and cats, existing evidences for the abilities of these species to host, sustain intraspecific transmission, and generate novel flu A lineages through genomic reassortment. Such enhanced understanding suggests a need to reinforce surveillance of the role played by companion animals-human interface, in light of the “One Health” concept and the potential emergence of novel zoonotic viruses.
Influenza is an acute infectious respiratory disease caused, in humans, by influenza type A or type B viruses. While the latter type circulates only among humans, influenza A viruses (IAV) can also be isolated from a wide variety of animal species. Wild migratory birds and bats are main natural reservoirs, from where virus uses to spill over into other animal hosts like ducks, chickens, horses, pigs, whales, cats, dogs, etc. IAVs viruses commonly exhibit restricted host range, but occasionally transmit from one species to another host (1). Notably, numerous spillover events arose primarily from poultry and swine that pose a significant threat to human health as historically, most human pandemics have emerged from avian and swine hosts (2, 3). In a world where the number of cat and dog owners is increasing, and social behavior tends to enroll these animal species as family members (4–6), this review aims at providing an up-to-date picture of the epidemiology of IAV in dogs and cats and their transmission modes. Their evolution and the consequences of genetic reassortments of IAV are further discussed, leading us to provide recommendations on surveillance tools and on the role that diagnostic tools could play in the “One Health” concept approach.