Please help me understand

[Reiterfamily]

Please help. My 2 cats were exposed to a sick cat for 2.5 weeks, they are not in the cats presence anymore as of 2 days ago. I got them tested as a precaution after finding out the other cat was sick. These are their results. They are showing zero symptoms.

 

[Kieka]

How old are your cats? Where did you get them from?

Feline coronavirus is an incredibly common virus in the cat population. It's considered endemic by many in multi-cat households, cattery, and shelter environments. With some studies finding incident rates in the 70% range if more than 5 cats are housed in the same area but only a 25% chance of a single cat household having it. Generally speaking, most cats will be exposed as kittens in a shelter environment and have a short bout of illness in which they are contagious. Once they stop shedding the virus though they are not contagious (although some can shed for a longer period of time).

A majority of cats with feline coronavirus live long healthy lives with minimal complications. About 10% will experience complications including the possibility of developing FIP (which is incredibly deadly and only recently was a treatment found). Most feline coronvirus carriers are prone to getting stress induced illnesses where they can develop diarrhea, respiratory illness and digestive issues. It's best to keep feline coronovirus carriers in a minimal stress environment and ensure a balance diet to maintain optimal health.

My girl has the virus too, we discovered her status during a deep dive to figure out an unrelated problem (turns out she bumped her head really really hard). She was sickly as a kitten and did go through several random fever and digestive instances until her health leveled out around a year old. She likely got it when she was living on the streets in a feral colony. All her siblings died during a heat wave shortly after she was dropped on my doorstep (literally) but it also could have been they didn't have the support to stabilize after infection.

Depending on the age of your cats and where you got them from. It is entirely possible that they got it earlier in life and are asymptomatic carriers of r he virus now. Them being recently exposed to a sick cat could be unrelated. Of course, it's always best to be safe and monitor them to ensure they don't get sick. I like to keep pumpkin puree (not pie filling) on hand for diarrhea episodes. Just add a tablespoon to food when diarrhea occurs and monitor recovery. But otherwise, I wouldn't worry too much unless they start showing symptoms. Of course be alert for early signs of FIP and mention the coronavirus diagnosis should they develop those (loss of appetite, abdominal swelling, fever, weight loss, are the more common). For me, it's just one of those back of the mind things that I don't worry about but do just react earlier if I notice.

 

[Reiterfamily]

They are 2.5 years old, we've had them as kittens, they are strictly inside their whole lives. I'm so stressed. We feed stray cats outside our house for several years. And one of them gave birth the kittens two and a half years ago and that's how we acquired them. As a matter of fact the sick cat that they were exposed to for two and a half weeks was one of their moms who decided to come into our house, and we just let her stay. Not realizing that she was sick until we saw some symptoms. But they are not around her anymore and haven't been for 2 days now. This is what gave us the red flag once we removed her, to test our two cats and this is the result that we got

 

[Reiterfamily]

Thank you for the advice. How old is your kitty now?

 

[Furballsmom]

Hang in there, you've received excellent advice above.

Regarding stress, both theirs and yours, don't forget that cats are extremely aware of our emotions so you'll want to be as calm as you can

Also, Cat Music can be helpful in getting cats to be more relaxed.

Are you still feeding the outside cats? Are you able to get the momcat to the vet?

 

[Kieka]

Thank you for the advice. How old is your kitty now?

My girl is 7 years old, will be 8 in the spring. She's a little spitfire and, outside of her first year and when she bumped her head, has been very healthy.

Given the sick cat was Mom and they came from a stray, they likely have had the virus for a while. Mom illness may or may not be related to the coronvirus. She could be having a flair up due to something that happened or it could be completely unrelated to coronvirus.

 

[treeclimber]

According to the image you posted, the test your cats had was an antibody titer test, not a fecal PCR test. Being positive on an antibody test just means that they have been exposed to the virus at some point in their lives, not necessarily that they were infected recently.

Even if your cats were indoors their whole lives, they may have been infected by their mother as kittens. Once protection from colostrum antibodies wanes, kittens can be infected by their mothers.

An infected cat can shed the virus in its feces for up to 10 months at a high level, and then at a lower level for up to 2 years (and some cats shed it their whole lives). If their mother was a stray, she was probably young (strays often do not live long lives), and may still have been shedding virus from her own first infection when she had the kittens.

So as long as your cats weren’t bottle babies or weaned very early, there’s a reasonable chance that this was not their first exposure to feline coronavirus. If they were exposed at all this time. The primary route of transmission for feline coronavirus is contact with the feces of an infected cat, so unless they shared a litter box with the stray the chances that’s she’s the one who infected them are probably lower than you think. And if her positive test was also an antibody test and not fecal PCR then you don’t even know if she was shedding virus and capable of infecting other cats.

For a cat, feline coronavirus is usually no big deal. It’s a bit like chickenpox - there wasn’t a chickenpox vaccine until 1995, so right now most adult humans have the virus lurking in our bodies from a childhood infection. A few unlucky people will have it cause shingles later in life, but for the vast majority of us our immune systems will keep it in check and we will never have any problems from it.

Shelters test for certain viruses (FIV, FeLV) when they take in a cat because they do not want an infected cat to spread it to other cats in the shelter. They do not test for feline coronavirus - it’s not a big enough threat to be worth it, and it’s common enough that a high percent of the cats they take in have already been exposed anyway.

 

[Reiterfamily]

I am so relieved at your reply. After going to another veterinarian they pretty much said the EXACT same thing you just said. Except I LOVE the comparison of chicken pox to shingles, I will be using that analogy with my family, I couldn't have explained it better. Thank you so much for making me feel that much more at ease. Sawyer and Peaches, thank You Lord, are asymptomatic and like you said may just have exposure titers. Please keep them in your prayers anyway! Thank you everyone for your support