Webinar covers COVID-19 and veterinary teams

A recent webinar presented by the World Small Animal Veterinary Association provided an update on the impact of COVID-19 on patients and veterinary teams.

The webinar featured Michael Lappin, chair of the WSAVA One Health Committee, and Richard Squires, chair of the WSAVA Vaccination Guidelines Group.

Lappin reminded attendees that in cases when pets have been diagnosed with the new coronavirus, it was a case of humans passing it to them. He advised veterinarians to encourage pet owners to treat companion animals that do test positive with kindness and not to relinquish them. (The AVMA advises pet owners who test positive for the virus to limit contact with pets, just as they would with other people.)

Squires advised that risk-benefit analyses are especially important now for vaccination consultations. He said the priority should be to protect puppies and kittens using core vaccines with the last or only dose given no earlier than 16 weeks because of persistent maternal antibody interference in some individuals.

The webinar is available for viewing online.

Study shows cats shed the virus, dogs don’t, and neither gets sick.

A recent study confirmed that cats and dogs can be infected by the virus, and neither animal is likely to get sick. Cats develop a strong, protective immune response, which may make them worth studying for human vaccines.

While there’s no evidence suggesting pets have passed the virus to humans, cats do shed the virus and infect other cats. As for why they don’t infect humans, one possible reason is that the number of humans who have contracted the virus is so large, and they’re giving it to cats. It’s also possible that infection in the lab is very different from infection in everyday life.

The New York Times reports.