Available online 5 August 2015
Highlights
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- Cats engage in behaviors that can lead to disease acquisition and transmission.
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- Many diseases found in cats are zoonotic and of concern to human health.
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- Managing cats allowed outdoors is important for reducing incidences of disease.
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- Disease prevalence is likely to increase due to changes in climate and land use.
Abstract
Domestic cats (Felis catus)
are a common household pet and also a notorious invasive species around
the world. Because cat numbers have been increasing in many locations
it is critical to work on management solutions that help to reduce
threats posed by cats. With regard to cat behavior, one of the threats
both to cats themselves and the species that they interact with is
disease transmission. As part of a broader overview on applying cat
behavior to management the focus of this review is to consider different
types of cat behaviors and highlight how they relate to disease as a
means to help inform management. Specifically, we focus on cat movement,
foraging, and cat–human interactions as broad classes of cat behavior
that can lead to acquisition and transmission of diseases. In addition,
we review the diseases that are commonly harbored by cats, are of
growing human health concern, and for which we have reasonable
information. Finally, we review the main forms of cat management in
order to provide a set of recommendations for use in addressing cat
diseases.
Keywords
- Diet;
- FeLV;
- FIV;
- Home range;
- Movement ecology;
- Plague;
- Rabies;
- Toxoplasmosis
Copyright © 2015 Published by Elsevier B.V.
