Can Pets Get COVID-19?

Can Pets Get Covid-19?

May 26, 2020 by Dr. Sigrun Hackl

The question keeps popping up and scary news float through the media, worrying many of our pet owners. Especially cats seem to be seen as potential carriers. So what is behind this? Scarmongery? Cat haters? Some truth? Let’s take a closer look at the reports and what we really know.

Worldwide we are looking at close to 6 millions confirmed cases of Covid-19 today, yet we only have a handful of reports of it being found in cats or dogs. One main source of information is a study performed in China in April this year. This study found that cats can develop symptoms and pass Covid-19 to other cats. Yet, can they?

Taking a close look at the study, these are some of the stated facts:

7 juvenile cats (6 to 9 months of age) were used for the study, and the study was repeated with kittens (max 3 months of age).
Cats received a high dose of virus directly into their noses.
Virus RNA was then found in the cats, mostly in the upper respiratory system (nose, sinus, throat).
In order to test the transmissibility of the virus between cats, 3 juvenile healthy cats were placed in cages next to 3 of the inoculated cats. Out of these, ONE became positive. The two other cats remained negative.
They found more pronounced lesions in kittens than in juvenile cats, yet do not give information regarding number of kittens (probably 7 in total again, the information is unfortunately not very clear).

So what does this study tell us? Not so much, really. It tells us that the virus can replicate in cat’s upper respiratory system, however, the infectious load that these cats were exposed to was very high and it was given directly into their nose. Only one out of three became positive after a more ‘natural’ exposure through other infected cats.

So, how likely is such a high exposure in a normal household setting? Can we really conclude based on 7 total cats and one natural infection? What about their age? Cats at 6-9 months old are immature and do not have a strong immune system, not to mention the use of less than 3 months old kittens. So all this really tells us is that it is theoretically possible for the virus to reproduce in cats upper respiratory systems. As opposed to dogs, where no replication happened.

So what else do we know? We have some newspaper reports about positive tested animals, mostly felines, that all share a common factor: There was a Covid-19 positive owner or caretaker involved. It appears that generally symptoms in felines were mild, if any, though information is scarce in this regard. There is also not a single report from a human getting infected via their pet. On the other hand we have one of the biggest international veterinary labs performing routine tests on dogs’ and cats’ samples. So far, NONE tested positive.

Reminder, we are at around 5 million cases in the human population, yet not seeing any on routine screening and having very individual news reports of positive findings in pets. So is there a risk of pets involved? Highly unlikely. I would say that your cat might worry if you become positive, yet there is absolutely no evidence that humans can catch the disease from their pets. And with sufficient hygienic rules, we can probably eliminate all risks.

If you are sick:

Do not cough into your pets face (or anyone’s, at that).
Wash your hands frequently, especially before you eat something, or after touching your pet (this is actually a general all time rule!).
Keep a distance (at least to strangers and sick people). And stay positive!

References:

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/early/2020/04/07/science.abb7015

https://www.idexx.com/en/about-idexx/news/no-covid-19-cases-pets