Good point - let's also not forget that in countries around the world where pet food industries have not been so strongly established, people continue to feed raw meat scraps to cats and it's considered normal.
By natural I meant what cats do in the wild. Like just because they eat no/smaller amount of grains does not necessarily mean it's better for their health. Diets didn't evolve for a long life. Most of the time it's a combination of promoting early fertility to keep the species going and a matter of sources around. Whether the commercials food formulas being better or not is still another discussion. I mean obviously not all do considering some brands don't do any research whatsoever at all.
Well they probably make food to keep the cats healthy and alive considering food is always blamed when a cat gets sick, the best advertisement is "my cat eats this and she's alive and healthy", and an alive cat will continue to be a customer.
That's my personal #1 skepticism about commercial diets. Like you said meat is expensive and there may not even be enough meat for all the customers considering these brands are everywhere but the production is limited to 1 or couple countries. The rest imports from them.
You have a point but also, the chances are cats in the nature couldn't eat as much meat as housecats could. Even indoor-outdoor cats typically do not exercise as much as their ancestors did who had to hunt for food AND run away from predators. Heart health alone makes me question how an animal-products-only diet would work in a housecat. Exercise plays a role in cats' heart health too for example and a housecat having even more meat than a cat in the nature who gets more exercise... we don't have data what this difference would/could make in their health.
And I'm following all the experiences I can find! :-) That said, personally I know zero person whose cat is a senior now and been on a raw diet all/most his life. I couldn't get anything about a longterm-diet from "my cat has been on a raw diet.. for 3 years now."
I'm pretty sure human doctors also advise against humans eating uncooked meat. Cats do not eat cooked meat in the wild but they also get diseases from the preys they eat. Human doctors also advice against making meat a big part of our diets although we are omnivores - the general conclusion seem to be making meat only a small part of our diet as with our lack of exercise and all as much meat as our ancestors did would be just too much for us that leads to earlier death.
MissClouseau
What matters is that you’re at least asking questions and trying to find the best solution for your cat. For me, it really just comes down to logic and understanding the cultural and historical context of the pet food industry. The question of whether grains or legumes should be fed to cats shouldn’t even be a question. We already know that they are carnivores. The only reason it’s a question is because of the creation of a pet food industry ... it’s a business and money issue. The real question for the pet food companies is “what can we replace animal protein with in our foods that won’t kill people’s cats and save us a ton of money?”
Cats can and do get viruses and bacteria from raw meat. One of them: Avian influenza, aka bird flu. For another thing that is much more common: toxoplasmosis.
It’s true that they can, but what we are saying is that the fear of it is overblown. Cats have also become ill and died from kibble. They aren’t immune to disease, but their digestive tracts are built to handle bacteria much better than humans. Imagine a cat walking around outside in the dirt and garbage all day and then licking his paws and grooming. They have to be able to handle all kinds of bacteria.
I haven't seen a research about a single country on this so this is very unrealistic to wish but I wish there was a research that compares how much geography plays a role on things like this. Like I don't think meat is safe/risky the same amount everywhere for example, naturally there would be a difference between how safe/risky a raw diet it is for cats over this alone.
