If a young kitten is diagnosed with cat flu and then gets better and is consequently vaccinated against it every year do they or are they then able to pass the virus on to other cats or are they safe?

It depends on which virus the cat has. With calicivirus, they can elmininate it completely and are not then infectious to other cats (although they can still get infected again at a later date, as there are many different strains of the virus) With herpes, they become infected for life, however they may never actually shed the virus again and so would never infect other cats. OTOH some herpes infected cats can shed virus when stressed. e.g. when a queen has kittens. There's no way to tell between these 2 groups it's about 50-50 as to whether a herpes cat ever sheds virus again after initial infection.

vaccination for calici and herpes is not 100% effective, only around 60%, so vaccinated cats can still be infected although it should only be a mild infection.

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I can only second the advice above....if a cat has had calici, it stops shedding the virus after about 75 days after infection and is therefore not infectious to other cats. As long as the cat remains stress free, it should eliminate the virus completely.

With herpes, it is much nastier and cannot be eliminated but can basically lay dormant after the initial infection.

Lou
X

oooo, now i'mout of my comfort zone - what is the difference between these two virii? Basically, my moggy was a very porly kitten when we got him 18mths ago. The vet said he had cat flu (sneezing, dodgy tum, diaroeha (sp) and sore eyes. He had the normal vacinations (including for cat flu) when he was well enough. How can I tell which virus he might have had andwhether he might still be infectious. I ask as my birman is hopefully preggers and i want to know whether to keep him separated from her (and the kits). He is due his jabs again really soon so will the vet be able to do a test to find out whether he could infect her? What would you suggest?

Some info links for you

Q&A - Calicivirus

Feline upper respiratory tract disease

ooo, that looks bad! It looks like my boy is infectious no matter what. what should i try to do? I can only keep him away frommy lassie by making himan exclusively outdoors cat, or fostering him out whilst she is preggers and nursing. Is this fair to him? I don't really want to rehome him but maybe it would be fairer to find him another home rather than to keep him outside or keep fostering him out? What does everyone suggest (please no shouting - i am EXPLORING options here and have made no desicions)

Thank you - i've been trawling a few threads and some got a bit heated - so wanted to avoid that. But am in a pickle re the young man and young lady!

You can have swabs done hunny to find out which one or see if there's anything laying dormant xx

the problem is with the URI's is that unless you have the tests you'll never know which one it is as symptoms are relatively the same xx

I would definitely be careful about him being around the kittens sweetie xx hard choices ahead bless ya xx hugs from me xx

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