COVID-19 anomaly triggered far less cat deaths than declared, Cyprus veterinary leader says

NICOSIA, Cyprus — The head of Cyprus’ veterinarians’ association on Wednesday dismissed as groundless claims that a lethal mutation of a virus has taken the lives of some 300,000 cats, saying they misleadingly depicted the small island nation abroad as a “feline cemetery.”

The director of the Pancyprian Veterinary Association, Nektaria Ioannou Arsenoglou, says the numbers presented by local animal activists and amplified by foreign media outlets “simply don’t add up” because a study of 35 veterinary centers carried out by the Association just suggest an island-wide overall of around 8,000 such deaths.

Arsenoglou informed the Associated Press Wednesday the regional anomaly of Feline Infectious Peritonitis (FIP), triggered by the feline variation of the coronavirus, is almost constantly deadly if left neglected, however medication can nurse cats back to health in roughly 85% of cases. Spread through contact with cat feces, neither the infection or its anomaly can be handed down to human beings.

But particular medication that can treat both the so-called “wet” and “dry” kinds of the health problem is extremely pricey, although Arsenoglou said she was “optimistic” that efforts with federal government authorities to secure medical products would quickly flourish.

It’s uncertain the number of feral cats reside in Cyprus, however they have a long history on the island. According to Byzantine legend, cats were presented to Cyprus by Saint Helen on her method back to Constantinople after finishing her mission to discover the cross on which Jesus Christ was crucified to fight the substantial variety of poisonous snakes then afflicting the island.

Feral cats are precious by the frustrating bulk Cypriots, who go above and beyond to feed and take care of the felines.

A Cypriot cat activists who passes the name Marina Niaou and who keeps a feral cat nest grumbled to the AP that authorities have actually been dragging their feet in locating low-cost mediation to take on the spread of the infection.

The anomaly pertained to the attention of vets in addition to the island’s plethora of cat caretakers in January this year, with cases continuing to increase gradually up until mid-spring when, Arsenoglou said, they began to level off.

According to Arsenoglou, the Association has actually assembled a “task force” of expert vets to keep track of the spread of the anomaly in addition to to notify both fellow veterinarians and activists of the latest advancements.

The feline coronavirus has actually been around because 1963. Previous upsurges, consisting of one in Greece more than 20 years earlier, ultimately died without using any medication, Arsenoglou said.

Measures have actually already been enacted to avoid the export of the anomaly through obligatory medical check-ups of all felines predestined for adoption abroad.