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How Your Cat Is Making You Crazy
The Atlantic ^ | March 2012 | Kathleen McAuliffe

Posted on 04/03/2014 4:37:56 PM PDT by Nachum

No one would accuse Jaroslav Flegr of being a conformist. A self-described “sloppy dresser,” the 53-year-old Czech scientist has the contemplative air of someone habitually lost in thought, and his still-youthful, square-jawed face is framed by frizzy red hair that encircles his head like a ring of fire.

Certainly Flegr’s thinking is jarringly unconventional. Starting in the early 1990s, he began to suspect that a single-celled parasite in the protozoan family was subtly manipulating his personality, causing him to behave in strange, often self-destructive ways. And if it was messing with his mind, he reasoned, it was probably doing the same to others.

The parasite, which is excreted by cats in their feces, is called Toxoplasma gondii (T. gondii or Toxo for short) and is the microbe that causes toxoplasmosis—the reason pregnant women are told to avoid cats’ litter boxes. Since the 1920s, doctors have recognized that a woman who becomes infected during pregnancy can transmit the disease to the fetus, in some cases resulting in severe brain damage or death. T. gondii is also a major threat to people with weakened immunity: in the early days of the AIDS epidemic, before good antiretroviral drugs were developed, it was to blame for the dementia that afflicted many patients at the disease’s end stage. Healthy children and adults, however, usually experience nothing worse than brief flu-like symptoms before quickly fighting off the protozoan, which thereafter lies dormant inside brain cells—or at least that’s the standard medical wisdom.

(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: cat; cats; crazy; disease; kittyping; tgondii; toxoplasmosis
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To: Daffynition; Slings and Arrows

41 posted on 04/04/2014 5:11:29 AM PDT by Focault's Pendulum (I live in NJ....' Nuff said!)
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To: Slings and Arrows

I worried about toxoplasmosis until I read the article. The symptoms are described so well that I realized I don’t have any.

Thanks very much for the ping.


42 posted on 04/04/2014 5:11:47 AM PDT by TheOldLady
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To: TheOldLady

Da nada.


43 posted on 04/04/2014 5:41:17 AM PDT by Slings and Arrows (Richard Warman censors free speech.)
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To: Nachum

And here I thought my cats were only making me crazy by clawing the furniture and demanding near-constant attention...


44 posted on 04/04/2014 6:27:46 AM PDT by ZirconEncrustedTweezers (I'm not anti-government, government's anti-me.)
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To: rlmorel

A friend of mine took two kittens from the last litter my tortie had. He’s an orange tabby with some white markings, and my friend swears he’s a conservative because he hisses at Rachel Maddow when she appears on TV.


45 posted on 04/04/2014 6:30:31 AM PDT by ZirconEncrustedTweezers (I'm not anti-government, government's anti-me.)
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To: ZirconEncrustedTweezers

I meant “one of the kittens is an orange tabby.” The other is a silver tabby-point, and I warned my friend before he took her that she’s a radical anarchist.


46 posted on 04/04/2014 6:31:45 AM PDT by ZirconEncrustedTweezers (I'm not anti-government, government's anti-me.)
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To: bigheadfred

Change your cat’s focus. Next time your cat jumps on the kitchen table, throw a toy mouse on the floor. Pretty soon, you’ll be left alone.


47 posted on 04/04/2014 6:36:26 AM PDT by MrsEmmaPeel (a government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take everything you have)
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To: TheOldLady
Infected women, on the other hand, presented in exactly the opposite way: they were more outgoing, trusting, image-conscious, and rule-abiding than uninfected women.

Whew!

Had me worried there for a moment.

I am happy to report no symptoms!

48 posted on 04/04/2014 6:36:33 AM PDT by Harmless Teddy Bear (Proud Infidel, Gun Nut, Religious Fanatic and Freedom Fiend)
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To: Focault's Pendulum
You're toast!


49 posted on 04/04/2014 9:18:45 AM PDT by Daffynition ("If you think you can do a thing or think you can't do a thing, you're right." ~ Henry Ford)
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To: Nachum

He also made no effort to hide his scorn for the Communists who ruled Czechoslovakia for most of his early adulthood. “It was very risky to openly speak your mind at that time,”

A proposed symptom, maybe Freepers can be cured?


50 posted on 04/04/2014 9:36:20 AM PDT by PeterPrinciple
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To: Nachum

Reading the comments, few have read the article. This is the best reporting I have seen in a long time. The contrast between this and the swill we get from the media is huge.


51 posted on 04/04/2014 9:37:49 AM PDT by PeterPrinciple
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To: xrmusn

Heh, we know who has whom trained here!


52 posted on 04/04/2014 10:29:46 AM PDT by rlmorel ("A nation, despicable by its weakness, forfeits even the privilege of being neutral." A. Hamilton)
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To: ZirconEncrustedTweezers

LOL! I would record that and put it on Youtube!

(they would probably demand I pull it!)


53 posted on 04/04/2014 10:30:30 AM PDT by rlmorel ("A nation, despicable by its weakness, forfeits even the privilege of being neutral." A. Hamilton)
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To: rlmorel

Bookmark


54 posted on 04/04/2014 10:51:15 PM PDT by publius911 ( At least Nixon had the good g race to resign!)
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To: rlmorel

Bookmark


55 posted on 04/04/2014 10:51:17 PM PDT by publius911 ( At least Nixon had the good g race to resign!)
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