They could be useful in understanding it for humans as well.
This is of particular current interest, given that we just spent several thousand dollars for surgery for one of the cats to remove a tumor in the small intestine. Fortunately, it appears that they got it all, and the prognosis for the 7YO is good.
Maybe that’s just the toxoplasmosis talking.
In a slightly more serious vein, anybody else wonder what kind of evolutionary pressure is the spay/neuter campaign exerting on domestic cats in America?
And they can say they’re studying naturally infected cats, and call them ‘research partners’ all day long; they’re still going to catch hell when the public decides they’re doing evil lab experiments on kitties. Good thing they’re in HK.
Glad to read that your cat is doing well. A great niece of ours had a Russian Blue that had been her constant companion through recovery from a near fatal motorcycle accident, which made him her favorite pet ever.* He developed lung cancer of all things, but lived quite some time with some medication the vet provided. I wonder about both – the lung cancer and the medication.
* We had a Russian Blue as well, and he was the greatest cat I ever had.
Current thinking with dogs is that getting them fixed in the first few years of life lead to cancers and other problems. Held off on cutting the balls off my current dog and probably wont do it.
Good to hear about your cat. Amazing what can be done these days.
Isn’t it interesting that while it is increasingly expensive, surgeries on pets is so much less expensive that a similar surgery in humans?
Surgery for both pets and people seems crazy expensive to me.
Chronic kidney disease is even more common in elderly cats than in humans. I would bet the high carbohydrate content of the modern diet eaten by both species is a major contributing factor.
https://youtu.be/jldxEVTniQA?t=991&si=s-SUGDzga6xsYdNk