How Your Cat Is Making You Crazy

[Swede]

What a disturbing story.

snip

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.

But if Flegr is right, the “latent” parasite may be quietly tweaking the connections between our neurons, changing our response to frightening situations, our trust in others, how outgoing we are, and even our preference for certain scents. And that’s not all. He also believes that the organism contributes to car crashes, suicides, and mental disorders such as schizophrenia. When you add up all the different ways it can harm us, says Flegr, “Toxoplasma might even kill as many people as malaria, or at least a million people a year.”

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/03/how-your-cat-is-making-you-crazy/8873/

[gateley]

1. I probably shouldn't read this. I'm already pissed at my cat today. nt

[lumberjack_jeff]

2. Reason 3604 why I prefer dogs. n/t

[REP]

23. Reason 3604 why I like cats:

[Arugula Latte]

47. That, and kitties don't bark and slobber

Plus they are much cuter and softer than dogs and they purr.

[REP]

51. I'm not a dog-hater at all

In fact, I'm friends with many insanely cute and well-behaved dogs (including my niece and nephew!). Cats just don't have as many questionable dietary practices as dogs do I "get" cats better than I do dogs, but I have to admit to being soft on just about all critters.

I'm lousy in any cats v dogs war - while it's easy to name all the good points cats have, and the few noticeable bad dog things ... all in all, when we move to our house, we'll probably have a big dopey dog, too.

[Fawke Em]

52. Cuter and softer?

Hardly.

My dogs are far softer than our wirey cat.

And puppies beat kittens in the cute department, hands down.

I don't "get" cats, too much. I like ours and he likes me, but I like my dogs better.

[Arugula Latte]

60. Well ...

I've never seen a puppy that was cuter than a kitten. I've lived with dogs, too, and I liked the cats better. C'est la vie; we'll never agree.

[mrs_p]

3. While true that cats are the definitive hosts for T. gondii,

they shed the oocyte for two weeks once they are infected. http://www.vet.cornell.edu/fhc/brochures/toxo.html

So, yes, it is possible to get the organisms from you cat, but more likely most of the 60 million Americans infected were so by eating undercooked meat. http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/toxoplasmosis/gen_info/faqs.html

Edited to add that my cats make me crazy with or without Toxo!

[BlueCaliDem]

5. Thank you for this! I feel more relieved now.

I was getting kind of frightened there for a moment.

[REP]

8. This is a theory that's been out there - in all senses of that phrase - for a while now

[kestrel91316]

20. Correct. Everyone like to blame the cat, when it's their own

poor food handling/cooking techniques that pose the biggest risk.

That said, i have often wondered since hearing this report (it's a few years old) if my mom, who was paranoid schizophrenic and the daughter of "cat people" wound up with her problem because of all the cats my grandmother was exposed to in her youth and poor hygiene (depression-era) in the kitchen and such.

[BlueCaliDem]

4. Very disturbing. I have just adopted a cat

for the first time in my life (I'm actually a big dog person), and now this kind of news gives me pause to wonder. My cat was abandoned on a grocery store parking lot and I took her in.

Anyway, she just came from the vet, she's an indoor cat, and according to her vet she's healthy.

[mrs_p]

9. Stories like these are so misinforming

Sorry to say it this way, but you might already have Toxo. Many Americans do (http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/toxoplasmosis/gen_info/index.html). And, we often get it from eating undercooked meat. If your cat gets Toxo, she will shed for a few weeks. How she will get it is by eating infected feces or meat. So, best to keep her inside away from potential sources (which it sounds like you are doing ).

However, having spent some time outdoors, she may have already been infected, shed, and will no longer pose a threat (says my veterinary internal medicine professor). However, if you are pregnant, why not have the partner clean the box ("just to be safe&quot .

Here's some more on it, http://www.vet.cornell.edu/fhc/brochures/toxo.html, and please talk to your vet if you have any concerns. S/he is there for you.

Congrats on your new addition!! You are doing a great thing!!

[BlueCaliDem]

28. Thank you, mrs_p. I just fell in love with my Cali-Bastet

because she is so loving and sweet. I can't understand how people can just dump their pets on parking lots and leave them there to either get picked up or to die. It broke my heart. I heard her meowing so pathetically. She was scared and tiny and she could've been run over by one of those giant SUVs or Dodge trucks that are so prolific around my neighborhood since we leave close to the mountains.

I didn't have the heart to leave her. Then again, she ignored other people and only came out to me when I called to her. I like to think she was waiting for me to take her home.

[KT2000]

34. Awww! She picked you!

It was meant to be!
Thanks for your good heart.
She is a cutie!

[BlueCaliDem]

38. Thanks, KT2. She *is* an angel - unless she gets really frisky! lol

I never thought I could love a cat as much as I love Cali. She's so clever, protective, playful, vocal, attentive, and surprisingly, obedient!

My first cat friend and I'm totally hooked!

[kestrel91316]

21. Don't eat her poop. Don't feed her raw or incompletely cooked meat.

Keep her indoors so she doesn't hunt any more prey than she already has. Scoop the litter box daily.

And always wash your hands before preparing your food, along with keeping countertops scrupulously clean.

Basic hygiene and common sense >>>> really low risk of Toxo.

And yes, as a veterinarian with a cat practice it's my job to be the expert on Toxo.

[BlueCaliDem]

26. Hah! I'll try not to eat her poop. ;-)

She's an indoor cat exclusively, but when I found her back in July 2011 she was a wee kitten, full of fleas, starving, and full of worms. Here's a picture of her two days after we'd found her and took her home.

She's just had her first heat cycle (lasted almost two weeks), and I have just had her spayed. In fact, that happened last Tuesday so she's still recuperating, but she's doing fine. I found an excellent Veterinarian in Rialto, CA, only seven minutes away from us.

Anyway, I "flush" her litterbox two to three times a day, I always wash my hands afterward (I'm almost obsessive compulsive when it comes to washing my hands with anti-bacterial soap that I have to have hand lotion on each sink otherwise my hands dry out), and I had dewormed her using Drontal, and only feed her Life's Abundance premium cat food (can and kibble). Oh, and I got her those Soft Paw nail caps so she can't harm our Pugs or our furniture.

She's a really sweet cat. She's allowed me to bathe her every two days in the beginning (husband's allergies were bad, but after bathing her a few times, his allergies let up and he's fine with her now - go figure) and I still bathe her once a week with Kitty shampoo. She's only fussed a couple of times when I snipped the tips of her nails before slipping on her nail caps (they're glitter pink this time!), and she lies with me when I take a nap on the sectional and follows me around like a puppy. lol

But thank you for the info. Since she's my first pet cat, this Toxo news seemed frightening to me, but thank you for the info. It's made me feel so much better.

[REP]

6. Wow, is this an old story

This theory is pretty old; I'm surprised The Atlantic is just picking up on it. And it is just a theory.

[HuckleB]

17. The Atlantic has gone downhill.

It has repeatedly post pseudo-scientific BS over the past few years.

Ugh.

[hedgehog]

48. I thought the claim that no one ever had schizophrenia

before we started keeping house cats was rather amusing. The evidence? no one wrote about it in a peer reviewed journal before then. Like maybe the facts that peer reviewed journals are relatively new and/or that the classifications of mental illnesses shift with time wouldn't be more likely?

[REP]

50. The earliest evidence of cats as pets is now back to 10,000 years ago I believe...

...but they didn't find a copy of the DSM buried with the kitten. Coincidence? I think not!

[elleng]

7. Beat me to it, Swede.

[LiberalEsto]

10. Wow. Fascinating article.

Thanks for posting it.

[Kennah]

11. This just in from Fox - Black cats are demonic and must be killed

[Poiuyt]

12. John Ashcroft thought calico cats were demonic

Really

[sakabatou]

13. Really?

[Kennah]

19. Snopes and TruthOrFiction say no

http://www.snopes.com/critters/gnus/calico.asp
http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/a/ashcroft-calico.htm

[FarCenter]

14. Calico cats are demonic

They are also almost always female.

[sakabatou]

30. Tell that to my calico

She's the sweetest thing in the world.

[BlueCaliDem]

37. My calico is the most angelic cat you'll ever meet

so I would never call any calico "demonic". Even in jest.

[FarCenter]

39. Even one that attacks and bites women's ankles

Doesn't attack men though.

[BlueCaliDem]

43. Okay...maybe there are exceptions. eom

[frylock]

31. they are..

i have a calico. her name is cuddles. she is evil incarnate.

[Rincewind]

33. I have two black cats,

and I think "demon possessed" is a little more accurate. It's hard to be totally evil when you sleep 18 hours a day, but, they do try. They were sleeping, but when I started writing about them, they woke up and are watching me. They do that a lot. I think they hope I'll play with them, or give them some kitty treats, they love kitty treats. And, I use one of those scoop things to clean out the litter boxes, not my bare hands. That helps. They are better than my last cat before them (who passed away a year and a half ago), that cat was allergic to me. She would get about 2 inches from my face, and sneeze. Sometimes 2 or 3 times a day. I didn't take it personally.

[HuckleB]

15. That's right. Let's keep pushing anecdotal "science" at DU.

[REP]

22. And be sure it's crap that's at least three years old!

If I had a dollar for every time this has been posted on DU, I could buy some nice shit

[jsmirman]

27. Seriously, this is BS

total fucking bullshit.

Here's a crazy idea - every time you handle your cats litter... WASH YOUR FUCKING HANDS!!!!

Because we don't have enough homeless cats.

Thanks for sharing this fearmongering garbage.

[REP]

29. No shit. Wash your hands, don't eat cat poo, handle raw meat carefully

Its not only the stray and feral cats - its the assholes who use any excuse to hurt cats. But bad science is sexy.

[jsmirman]

35. Well, thank you for pointing out how this is an old bit of nonsense

as someone who volunteered in a cat shelter for a year plus, it not only breaks my heart to hear people essentially saying, "screw all the homeless cats," but I also know what bullshit this is. Similar to what someone else related in this thread, I mean, post-cat shelter volunteering - and we scooped a lot of cat poo - I was exactly as crazy as I was before. Which is to say, plenty, but no different. It's just so damn frustrating to read this stuff.

Oh, and we made sure to never eat it. That was certainly a priority.

[REP]

53. All my cats have been strays or rescues ... not schizophrenic (yet)

My immune system is damaged from kidney disease, yet regular toxo has never been an issue, and I clean the litter boxes. It is so easy to avoid problems with litter boxes; they just need to kept clean! As many have mentioned, meat is more a threat than cats or their litter boxes. I hate bad science; I really hate 'sexy' bad science that gives yet another excuse to mistreat or harm cats.

[The Genealogist]

62. Isn't it amazing you have to tell people that?

Wash your fucking hands after handling cat litter. Sound advice, to be sure, but shouldn't it be obvious? I suppose with some people it wouldn't be. Sad. Makes me shudder to think about shaking hands with someone.

Cats are wonderful creatures. I grew up around cats. I think I was 18 before I lived in a residence without a cat. I had one as an adult for years. Cats tend to mind their own business, unless they are hungry. I may be crazy, but it isn't cats that caused that. If anything, having a cat around as company helped me NOT be crazy. I wonder how many people have dumped cats because of this woo-woo fear-mongering.

[jsmirman]

63. How about the BS about baby in, pet "now disposable"

what a horrific, cruel thing to do to an animal that will be hurt, traumatized, hopeless and betrayed because the person that does that is a thoughtless a-hole?

When the truth is that, when people have your experience, they tend to be less prone to having every allergy under the sun.

Cats and dogs are both safe to have around children, as long as you exercise reasonable/not insanely poor parenting. If you have enough ability to take responsibility for bringing a child into the world, that should mean, by definition, that there will be nothing unsafe about having a pet in the house. It will make your child less likely to require the comforts of a hermetically sealed bubble, and it will teach them to be humane and caring.

[jsmirman]

64. Oh, and for my money - *that* is a disturbing story

that's the disturbing story right there - abandoned and homeless animals. Disturbs the heck out of me.

[The Genealogist]

65. When a person takes in an animal, he or she accepts responsibility for it

Responsibility should not just vanish when a child comes into the house. Of course, changes must be made in the household, but that is natural. Dumping the animal is irresponsible. The animal will think it is being punished, and will not understand what is going on. It likely won't live long; it will starve, be killed by a wild animal, run over.

It seems to me, today, that society expects children to be raised in the "hermetically sealed bubble" you mentioned. Having an animal around will indeed teach a child to be humane and caring, as well as an opportunity to teach the child responsibility as it grows up and feeds and otherwise takes care of the pet.

[justiceischeap]

16. My dad had some serious issues from toxoplasmosis infection

as did Bob Dylan (Dylan's problem was heart related, if I recall).

[Curmudgeoness]

18. I was crazy long before I ever got a cat.

[Sgent]

24. Toxoplasmosis Parasite May Trigger Schizophrenia And Bipolar Disorders

ScienceDaily (Mar. 11, 2009) — Scientists have discovered how the toxoplasmosis parasite may trigger the development of schizophrenia and other bipolar disorders.

The team from the University of Leeds’ Faculty of Biological Sciences has shown that the parasite may play a role in the development of these disorders by affecting the production of dopamine -- the chemical that relays messages in the brain controlling aspects of movement, cognition and behaviour.

Toxoplasmosis, which is transmitted via cat faeces (found on unwashed vegetables) and raw or undercooked infected meat, is relatively common, with 10-20% of the UK population and 22% of the US population estimated to carry the parasite as cysts. Most people with the parasite are healthy, but for those who are immune-suppressed -- and particularly for pregnant women -- there are significant health risks that can occasionally be fatal.

Dr Glenn McConkey, lead researcher on the project, says: “Toxoplasmosis changes some of the chemical messages in the brain, and these changes can have an enormous effect on behaviour. Studies have shown there is a direct statistical link between incidences of schizophrenia and toxoplasmosis infection and our study is the first step in discovering why there is this link.”

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090311085151.htm

[Drahthaardogs]

25. So is this why CRAZY CAT LADIES are crazy?

I guess the new term shall have to be catshitcrazy instead of batshitcrazy

[LiberalEsto]

40. lol

[slackmaster]

41. Crazy DOG ladies are every bit as pet-obsessed crazy as are crazy cat ladies

I know this from experience.

[Arugula Latte]

45. Yeah, the dog people are nuts.

[slackmaster]

59. And the compulsive Philatelists

Cut from the same cloth, all.

[MadHound]

32. So what should we do, kill all the cats?

That worked out real well the last time we tried it. Remember that little incident called the Plague? The spread was aided by the fact that humankind had done a serious genocide number on cats(which ate rats, which carried fleas) because they believed them to be witches' familiars.

Not to mention that this is horrendous, sensationalist bunk, since most toxoplasma is contracted through undercooked meat, not cats.

[lonestarnot]

36. What a pile of horseshit. Who eats out of their catbox besides the neighbors' dogs?

[eppur_se_muova]

49. Maybe they were confused by this ...

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/kitty-litter-cake/

[Swede]

54. You obviously didn't read the article,so why comment?

from the article

Given all the nasty science swirling around this parasite, is it time for cat lovers to switch their allegiance to other animals?

Even Flegr would advise against that. Indoor cats pose no threat, he says, because they don’t carry the parasite. As for outdoor cats, they shed the parasite for only three weeks of their life, typically when they’re young and have just begun hunting. During that brief period, Flegr simply recommends taking care to keep kitchen counters and tables wiped clean. (He practices what he preaches: he and his wife have two school-age children, and two outdoor cats that have free roam of their home.) Much more important for preventing exposure, he says, is to scrub vegetables thoroughly and avoid drinking water that has not been properly purified, especially in the developing world, where infection rates can reach 95 percent in some places. Also, he advises eating meat on the well-done side—or, if that’s not to your taste, freezing it before cooking, to kill the cysts.

[jsmirman]

61. The problem is your headline - and the way you couched it

"very disturbing..."

Because it really isn't "very disturbing." If I had a child who was eating cat litter, I might be concerned, but that kid is probably dumb enough/badly supervised enough to be putting all kinds of other things in his or her mouth

Unfortunately, those of us who have first hand experience with the suffering cats have been subjected to by a string of bullshit myths and assorted other forms of hokum are sensitive to such headlines that can promote anti-cat ridiculousness.

It's great that the author ultimately concludes that cats are safe as long as you're not a complete idiot, but the payoff comes too late. How many people will just read your headline? Well, you've already answered that one.

It's pretty simple: keep your pregnant wife, friend, whatever away from the cat's litter. She's pregnant, she doesn't need to bend down to change that crap, anyway. Also, when you clean the litter, always make your first stop the soap and water. Not very complicated.

The only value I get from an article like this is that I could show it to my mother who, when we are all together and the cat is with me, mocks my fastidiousness about thorough handwashing whenever I deal with the litter (multiple times a day). But the article would just freak her out, and that's pointless.

If you had a different headline, you would be getting different responses. But I don't think you can put that headline out there and be shocked when people are pissed off by it.

[Dragonbreathp9d]

42. Does it also make you crave more Toxo?

Therefore getting more and more cats as you descend into madness?

[agent46]

44. It's only disturbing if...

...you believe everything you read.

[Swede]

55. Read the fucking article before commenting.

Or are you being delibarately obtuse?

[Arugula Latte]

46. I wish I could unrec this

Bad science.

[Swede]

57. Where is the bad science?

I am amazed by people commenting without reading the article.

[Duer 157099]

58. Can you elaborate?

What is "bad" about the science?

[L0oniX]

56. No wonder DainBramaged is brain damaged.