Feline Herpesvirus

[donnam401]

Is this virus only contagious to other cats or can other animals or humans contract it from the cat as well?

[kramert]

I have been told by my vet that it is NOT contagious to humans or to other species, such as dogs. That's the info I got off the Internet as well.
Tara L. Kramer

[donnam401]

Thank you for replying to my post. I've been doing alot of research on this lately because my cat is now sick with the illness and I have to bolus him IV fluids and give antibiotics. He seems to be doing much better today. My daughter's parakeet died at the same time the cat was in his worst. I wasn't sure if there was a correlation or not. Ironic I guess.

[kramert]

It's been a real learning experience for me, believe me!! If you're giving antibiotics, it's probably to get rid of any secondary infections, as antibiotics won't do anything for a virus, such as feline herpes
L-Lysine is supposed to inhibit production of the virus - you can get something from your vet called Enisyl-F, or what I do is get lysine from a health-food store and give my kitty half of the capsule powder every day (I got the 500 mg. lysine, so half equates to approx. 250 mg. per day). I think I'm lucky in that I got a cat that doesn't seem to have a severe case, only weepy eyes. From what I've learned, you need to keep a close watch on any eye issues as it can be so severe as to cause ulcers in the eye and the animal can lose sight or lose the eye. I got a LOT of info just from Googling feline herpes don't know if you've already tried that.
Tara L.Kramer

[donnam401]

Thanks Tara, yes I googled it and got lots of info too. My cat didn't have the typical eye issues. If fact, he doesn't have any eye issue at all. What happened was that he started drooling a tan to dark brown drool from his mouth. He was lethargic and his mouth smelled like rotting flesh. I cleaned his face and opened his mouth to find an ulcer on the back of his tongue. He was lethargic and becoming dehydrated as well. So I took him to the vet right away and here we are today. He's doing much better. My kids want to get a kitten but I'm afraid now to put another cat in the house ever because I don't want to subject the poor thing knowingly to a lifelong illness.