This is a little bit of world cat news, which I find fascinating. The location is Uganda. For people unsure where this African country is, the map below will help – it is just west (to the left) of Kenya:
It took one male Ugandan veterinarian (“a tall, strong looking man” described as an “animal doctor”) and his three male Ugandan assistants (“who also looked strong”) to give a domestic kitten an injection. I presume the injection was a vaccination. The vet called his three assistants in from an adjacent room to help him.
And….the veterinarian wore thick gloves while he administered the injection. The other three men must have held the cat in position. The cat’s owner queried how he managed to use a hypodermic needle while wearing thick gloves.
The vet appears to do the same thing for all cats. The cats were standard domestic cats. Their names were (a) “Elsa” – three months old, and (b) a cat called “Michael” (see photo) who is smaller than Elsa.
So, what is going on? Either the vet is scared of domestic cats for no particular reason (unlikely) or the vet has had a nasty experience or knows something that we don’t.
There is only one disease that is really dangerous for a vet that can be transmitted from a domestic cat to a vet: rabies.
There are clear signs for rabies. However, during the first stage (1-3 days) the cat will show subtle signs of personality change. Cats can become more affectionate or irritable and aggressive. Perhaps the vet was protecting himself from a bite from a cat that might have rabies? It seems far fetched because rabies exists in the USA and vets there don’t do the kind of thing this vet did.
HAHAHAHAHA . . . . sounds really funny but I think people in general are afraid of FERAL CATS & KITTENS. I have seen many mature men and women talking about these free roaming cats so much superstitious stories that one time I myself became a bit afraid, but all the stories were only for the sake of getting rid of these cats and a deep hatred hidden behind their hearts and souls. Here they look at me strangely as I am a BRITISH GENERAL of 1857 and they are saying,”Sahib! does this LION don’t eat you up?”
All are idiots about cats and specially FERAL CATS. They are FERAL because our brains are FERAL, phuuuhaa 🙁
LOL. I like the British General bit. You are right though. There is a lot of ignorance about the cat and there is a lot of hidden fear which affects how people relate to the cat.
Look! Michael, it is not that way that I love to JOKE with my countrymen or with INDIA. No, Not at all! the fact is that I daily experience the events and questions of this kind of dark hatred about cats and specially kittens.
I have to revive. . . yeah! I have to re-think about the brains people have here. The TRUTH is always bitter. I say,” they don’t like cats” I mean in Pakistan. Because our Pakistan is divided into three classes of population.
a) Rich (1%)
b) Middle (30%)
c) Poor (69%)
Educated persons are those who can write their names. So, the govt. proudly 🙁 announces the figures of development in education sector every year, that we have progressed this and that, and every one knows this and that means ZERO 🙁 .
My question to the whole nation????
Do the nation agree upon keeping one cat per home inside home as pet? How many homes do we have in Pakistan?
Maybe one will come online and start explaining with anger that you westerns don’t have to be interested in our cats because we keep our animals safer than you, bloody westerns @I@.”
In this angry statement everyone can smell a deep black LIE.
And here comes AHSAN that knows what is exactly going on here and I am not an advocate of LAIRS.
Rich keep dogs and cats but very rare in Pakistan
Middle class don’t like cats or dogs, a very very few 1/10,000 keep a dog or a cat.
Poor can never keep such an animal as they have not a right to the basic life standards so how are they gonna feed such a pet??? understood answer. maybe feral cat or dog is kept there with them but that is 1/1,000,000
This is the fact and one more thing! The govt. is not interested in allocating the resources even not human resources of Pakistan, every thing goes in estimation even the population because we have not done the Census for many decades. Yeah TATA and BYE BYE 🙁
Michael! tell me . . . can you say that without neuter and Spay facility , A feral colony is generating 5 to 21 cats and the figure is constant here in Pakistan in one feral colony??? Is this possible with out neutering the male cat and spaying the female cat????
Anyone can tell me if I have a pair of cats, 1 male, 1 female, fully grown mature to their sexuality. They must be increased upto 4.5 Million within 3 years. and I have only 19 feral cats left in the colony, Where are the rest of my babies???? Are they gone to MEKKA????
Michael! I am burning HELL inside me, It’s not joke. Its serious 🙁 🙁 🙁
I think I figured this out. Someone in this vet office got injured by a half feral cat so they set a policy that every single cat be handled by multiple people to avoid such a situation happening again. Except that this kitten is harmless. Monty was that size when I caught him all by myself, without getting hurt, and he was completely wild. But many companies set policies that are a one size fits all solution to every situation. Their employees are not expected to think or have good judgement. Like the grocery chain here that cards everyone before they will sell you booze. If an eighty year old man comes in there to buy a six pack of beer, puts it in the basket on his wheeled walker and makes his slow painful journey through the store with it, when he gets up to the cash register the clerk is required to ask for ID to make sure he is over 21 years old. Our county sherrif went in there to buy beer and he got carded, although the clerk knew who he was. She would have been fired had she not asked for his ID. Stupid. About as stupid as “use four people every time you handle a cat” even when it’s a harmless kitten, but I’d put money on that being the reason for this silliness.
I think you are spot with this, Ruth. I am sure there are some wildcat hybrids in Uganda (the African Wildcat is found throughout Uganda and it mates with domestic cats) which will look like large domestic cats. And as you say feral cats can be aggressive so they have a uniform policy which makes things look a bit over the top when it comes to treating a small cat like Michael. It is probably in the vet’s insurance policy!