Los Angeles County health officials have identified three more cats with presumptive H5N1; the source of the virus has not yet determined, but experts suspect raw meat.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/23318290

  • Los Angeles County health officials are investigating a case of three cats presumed to have H5N1 bird flu
  • County officials confirmed the disease in two other cats who drank recalled raw milk and died

December 18, 2024

UPDATED: Confirmed H5 Bird Flu Detected in Los Angeles County Cats That Consumed Recalled Raw Milk - Public Health Investigating Additional Possible Cases in Cats http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/phcommon/public/media/mediapubhpdetail.cfm?prid=4908#:

  • Cethin@lemmy.zipEnglish
    8·
    3 days ago

    Wtf? First, isn’t milk bad for cats? Also, I don’t get the raw milk shit (unless you’re a farmer and it’s literally coming from your cows and you haven’t gotten around to boiling it yet). Hell, I don’t get why people are so obsessed with drinking animal milk at all. What’s wrong with people?

    • Optional@lemmy.worldOP
      3·
      2 days ago

      raw milk issues aside, milk isn’t necessarily bad for cats but it has to be watered down, they don’t do well with it "straight’.

  • EleventhHour@lemmy.worldEnglish
    32·
    4 days ago

    So, no only are there dumbasses drinking raw milk, and getting infected, they’re giving it to their pets, too. Monsters.

  • kibiz0r@midwest.socialEnglish
    21·
    4 days ago

    H5N1 is absolutely horrible in cats. If you have raw milk in the house, even if you plan to boil it yourself, please treat it like concentrated poison and make sure there’s no way for a pet to get to it.

    Symptoms of H5N1 infection in cats include labored breathing, bloody diarrhea and neurological abnormalities — loss of motor control, seizures, depressed mental state, stiff body movements, blindness, circling, copious eye and nose discharge and coma — with rapid deterioration and death in some cases.

    • Boddhisatva@lemmy.world
      16·
      3 days ago

      …in some cases.

      In some cases? Way to sugar coat things, L.A. Times.

      Coleman reports that the fatality rate for the current strain of H5N1 in cats has been around 67%

      Which tracks with this case. 3 cats infected in the house, and 2/3rds are dead. Keep your cats inside where they belong. They can catch H5N1 from birds they kill too.

    • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
      4·
      3 days ago

      even if you plan to boil it yourself

      There’s people who buy raw milk and pasteurize it at home? What’s the point?

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
    25·
    4 days ago

    L.A. has a terrible feral cat problem and people fucking feed them all the time. In the first apartment complex where I lived in the Hollywood Hills, not only did several people just leave cat food out in multiple bowls for the feral cats, other animals would come out of the hills and eat them too. I had to wait to go to my apartment more than once because a skunk was eating out of a cat food bowl on the walkway before I got to it.

    • 🇦🇺𝕄𝕦𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕕𝕔𝕣𝕠𝕔𝕕𝕚𝕝𝕖@lemm.eeEnglish
      27·
      4 days ago

      Feral cats are awfull. Here in aus in some states any non registered cat gets euthanised. Sounds cruel till u realise feral cats (and dickheads who let their cats out at night) kill millions of endangered birds and possums and are the primary cause of many spiecies decline.

      33 mammal species have been driven to extinction and cats are responsible for many (thats just mammals). They are a pest and one of the worste things we have done to the environment (well at least here in australia).

      Here is a picture of a Quoll we might lose them all forever if cats keep going at their current rate.

      Fuck cats.