Cat Health: FIP (part 2)

Steve~listened to this one, too, and even though she was a little more difficult to hear her viewpoint was still interesting--go ahead and try different therapies, or how will we ever find out? And I think you're right--if this was a dog disease there'd be a whole lot more studying going on. Thanks for listing the resources on the blog.

Steve, both great interviews. I don't think Dr. Pederson and Dr. Addie had substantial disagreements, just that one said it was worthless to try these questionable treatments and the other said it was worth a try. I think Dr. Pederson was saying to save your money and Dr. Addie was saying that , in the future, improvements may be made. I think they both agree that there is no scientific proof for their efficacy. BTW, both Marleen and Dr. Addie helped me personally after the death of my cat from FIP. I was concerned that I may bring back the corona virus from the shelter I volunteer at and have the same mutation thing happen all over again with my other cats. Dr. Addie sent me a personal email and assured me that could not happen. This is an example of what a wonderful and dedicated woman this is for taking the time out from her busy schedule.

My cat was sick for a long time, several months, before he succumbed to FIP. It was thought he had some kind of intestinal cancer. He had a mass in his colon and his entire intestinal tract was infected, along with the adjacent lymph nodes. It was never determined to be cancer because it was too dangerous to take a biopsy from the mass, but a biopsy was taken from the lymph nodes and it was negative. After Crusher died and I knew it was FIP, I researched the disease (your interview confirmed a lot of what I had learned) and discovered FIP mimics many diseases. However, Dr. Addie's interview raised a question in my mind. She said that a cat will die after days or weeks after the mutation of the corona virus. I was treating Crusher for months after Crusher had the mass in his colon and it must have been going for longer than that. Now I'm thinking that it may not have been the FIP that caused the colon infection, but the intestinal problem may have been the catalyst to cause the corona virus to mutate. Crush, for a long time, had what I thought to be IBD and I was treating him successfully with probiotics and enzymes for quite a while. Anyhow, if you do ever do follow up interviews, I think this would be an interesting topic to discuss. It's sort of a chicken or the egg the subject.

Since I am being long winded anyhow, let me agree and espouse on your remark that you made that a cure would be found by now if it was a dog disease. I love dogs as well as cats and I'm sure you feel the same, but the bias is uncanny. There are dog lovers that dislike cats but not many with the reverse sentiment. My theory is that dog only lovers need to be obeyed by someone or something. In other words, they love having their butt kissed. I personally admire the independent thinking of a cat. I think the attitudes we have towards the qualities of our animals duplicates our attitudes towards people. Dog only lovers need to be the boss. I have an online business that caters only to raw cat food. My friends say "what about dogs?". Dogs are great but if you do a search for raw pet food, EVERY site is either dedicated to only dogs or both cats and dogs. My site is the ONLY one dedicated to cats. Turns out anyway that much of the products are also dog appropriate. Another question related to one of your other topics is, would there be such an outrage about Michael Vick if he did the same to a bunch of cats? Hmmmm.

Just want to iterate your doing a great job for the welfare of the cats and want to thank you along with Susan Gingrich of the Winn Feline Foundation and Diane and Neils.