Posted on 05/21/2025 5:32:31 AM PDT by Red Badger
The first major global review of bird flu in cats reveals an emerging threat of a potential human pandemic.
Spring is here, birds are on the move, and a new threat is spreading alongside them: bird flu (H5N1). This virus is changing fast and could be on the path to becoming a human pandemic. Scientists from the University of Maryland School of Public Health have recently published a major study in Open Forum Infectious Diseases highlighting a surprising new concern. They found that cats are catching bird flu more often, and they’re calling for urgent monitoring to help stop the virus before it can spread between people.
“The virus has evolved, and the way that it jumps between species – from birds to cats, and now between cows and cats, cats and humans – is very concerning. As summer approaches, we are anticipating cases on farms and in the wild to rise again,” says lead and senior author Dr. Kristen Coleman, assistant professor in UMD School of Public Health’s Department of Global, Environmental and Occupational Health and affiliate professor in UMD’s Department of Veterinary Medicine.
“Bird flu is very deadly to cats, and we urgently need to figure out how widespread the virus is in cat populations to better assess spillover risk to humans,” she said. “We want to help protect both people and pets.”
Looking at data from 2004 to 2024, researchers uncovered 607 cases of bird flu in cats around the world, including 302 deaths. These cases spanned 18 countries and involved 12 different types of cats, from household pets to big cats like tigers. Despite the growing threat, cats are not routinely tested for bird flu. In most cases, testing only happens after the animal has died. Because of this limited surveillance, the real number of infections is likely much higher, according to lead researcher Dr. Kristen Coleman.
Increasing Transmission Pathways
Yet the ways cats are getting bird flu are multiplying. The study shows cats contract bird flu directly by eating infected birds or contaminated raw chicken feed, and indirectly through other mammals – for example, farm cats fed raw milk from infected cows, pet cats to other pet cats, tigers to other tigers.
Infected cats often suffer from acute encephalitis (brain swelling) and other severe symptoms, which are mistaken for rabies, according to the study. The most deadly strain of bird flu is highly infectious and makes up the majority of cases in domestic cats, with a current 90% case fatality rate.
In humans, bird flu is slightly less deadly, but still has killed around half of the 950 people infected with it globally. Between April 28, 2022 (when cumulative data on humans in the U.S. started being collected) and January 6, 2025, the United States has seen 66 confirmed cases in humans and one death.
Human Implications
Coleman and her team are particularly concerned about the potential for bird flu getting into animal shelters which could result in large outbreaks, potentially involving humans – similar or worse to what happened in New York City with a different strain of bird flu in 2016.
There are no reported cases of human-to-human transmission of bird flu, but researchers are concerned that as the virus spreads and evolves, it could become easily transmissible through the air.
“Our future research will involve studies to determine the prevalence of HPAI and other influenza viruses in high-risk cat populations such as dairy barn cats. Our research seeks to protect people and our vulnerable pet cats from the emerging threat of H5N1,” said Ian Gill Bemis, coauthor of the paper and doctoral student studying bird flu in cats.
Reference:
“Avian Influenza Virus Infections in Felines: A Systematic Review of Two Decades of Literature”
by Kristen K Coleman and Ian G Bemis, 7 May 2025, Open Forum Infectious Diseases.
DOI: 10.1093/ofid/ofaf261
Funding for this project was provided by the University of Maryland Baltimore, Institute for Clinical & Translational Research (ICTR) and the University of Maryland Strategic Partnership: MPowering the State (MPower) to KKC, as well as discretionary funding from the University of Maryland School of Public Health, Department of Global, Environmental, and Occupational Health to KKC.
60 cats sick but only 2 died in the American cited statistics?....doesn’t sound like a 90 percent fatality rate. This artice really mixes numbers and stats in a way that reminds me of the hidden ball under one of three cups game and the ball isn’t under any of them unitl the gullible shlub picks one whereupon the ball gets slipped under another unchosen one. Nothing but BS designed to make people feel on edge! They’ve shot their wad on the whole pandemic behavior control scheme.
The real shame is that a genuine epidemic could come along but no one will comply with the rules, especially the lawless woke criminals the Dems have been coddling.
Crazy cat ladies most affected...
May be because domestic cats often prey on and kill birds. Don’t eat your cat!
It has already jumped species if it infects wild birds and chickens, cows, cats and people.
Wow!
Now if only one of these hidden labs run by experts came up with a potent virus that only effected LIBs...
“could”
Conveniently timed for a new Trump administration. If there is a pandemic it will be due to a purposefully designed virus. Environmentalists want one.
Shoot the cat and get the vaxx! 😆
I lost my favorite cat to an outbreak of Feline Leukemia over 20 years ago and nothing can be done to stop outbreaks like that. Hopefully it won’t be severe and spread to other animals ... like humans
So approximately 15 cats died a year in 20 years ! The pharmaceutical companies must be desperate to tap into the love of cat owner’s pockets, now that the Faucian covid plandemic has waned.
My cat has nine lives and wants to tell Dr. Kristen Coleman to 'bite me'.
Next they will slaughtering everyone’s cats.
One of the things about criminal behavior is that if it worked once they will try it again and again thinking that it work again.
They got Trillions of dollars last time and nobody has been punished in this life, SOoooo . . .
Did you see my link to that study from 2006.
Zoonotic transmission is still not an issue unless you’re exposed to infected birds.
How come Canada and Mexico are not killing 100 million chickens?
Does the bird flu know where the borders are like the wuhan virus knew it was 6ft in the USA but 1 meter or 39 inches in Europe or followed you in a supermarket up one aisle and down another where there was an arrow telling you which direction to walk....
🦅
Hawk attacks a duck.
The way he keeps looking around to see if anybody is watching..
https://x.com/buitengebieden/status/1924513908255019057
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