VERY DANGEROUS Virulent Calicivirus strain

Hello, have any of you heard about this or had any experience dealing with it?

This is a mutated and much more dangerous strain of the common feline respiratory ailment calicivirus. It is highly contagious and can readily attack and kill healthy, adult, well-vaccinated cats, with a mortality rate between 40 and 60 (some say 80) percent.

It has appeared in some parts of the United States and probably other countries too so far, and most likely will sooner or later show up wherever we are. The standard FRTC and FVRCP vaccines are ineffective against it.

It has sickened entire households, clinics, and shelters. Affected animals must be isolated, all surfaces must be disinfected aggressively, and the facility may need to be closed for weeks to be sure the infection is eliminated. In other words, it results in a nightmarish scenario for all concerned.

More information is available at: http://www.dvmvac.org/swiftaction.asp and http://www.dvmvac.org/index.asp

A new vaccine has recently been developed by Fort Dodge Animal Health that protects from virulent calicivirus. See http://www.dvmnewsmagazine.com/dvm/a....jsp?id=408460 for more information.

That's what I know so far.

My vet told me about this and urged me to pass this information along to the shelter (and all other cat-owners I know). I told the shelter staff member with the longest and most experience. She asked her vet, who also treats some of the shelter cats, about it. This vet said she went to a workshop on it recently. Afterwards she gave the new vaccine to her clinic's 13 foster cats for adoption. Some 6 or 7 of them got sick enough in reaction to the vaccine to require immediate, serious, aggressive treatment to save their lives.

I told this to my vet, Dr. Lewis. She said she's been using it since it has been available (a month or two now), and has seen no problems and had none reported with it. One of the techs said she vaccinated her 11 cats with it, with no problems. AND... my Priscilla got it with no trouble whatsoever.

Dr. Lewis has used an updated version of the FRTC vaccine which also protects against the virulent calicivirus. (I gather there are also the virulent-calici vaccine alone and other vaccine-combinations including it.)

We wondered if the other vet just got a bad batch of whatever version of the vaccine she used. I told this to the shelter staff person. She thought we should keep getting information on it and meanwhile use up the standard FRTC vaccine we have now (quite a lot).

I am wondering if we should wait that long or if we should start giving all the cats the updated vaccine now. We don't have the virulent calici virus here.. YET... but I'm afraid it will get here one day or another. We have about 90-100 cats in our shelter.

Before I start agitating for revaccinating them all rather than just using up the old vaccine first, I want to find out more about this. So I am asking: have any of you encountered this, or heard of anyone who has or facilities where it's happened? Any experience with or reports on, the new vaccine, good or bad?

If this virus is as bad as it sounds like it is, and if this vaccine is as effective as it should be, then I would like to know as much as I can so I can urge as strongly as possible that all cats I have any influence over get vaccinated.

Thanks very much, everyone, and I will also put a link to this in Cat Health.

Pat

I believe that they had a case of that in a Burlington Pet Store and several Cats had to be PTS.
And two of the Volunteers had Cats that passed away as well.
Its a terrible disease and we hope that they can come up with a cure for it.

Thank you so much for the heads up on this! Honestly, this is the first I've heard about this and it does sound extremely serious. If you don't object, I'm going to talk to my friends and co-workers who are owned by cats. If anyone knows anything I'll pass the information along. :eek: :eek: :eek:

I responded to your post in "Cat Health".. I can't keep reliving the nightmare that never seemed to go away...but it did. ;) With a whole lot of fight! :eek:

The vet should report the side effect of the vaccine to the FDA and the company. When they do the testing for these drugs they only test on a small population of animals and not all side effects are observed. In alot of cases, new side effects are found once the product is released to the public. But the only way they find out is when people report back to them.

Thanks, everyone, for your replies.

Gary, I'm sorry to hear about the Burlington cats and those of the volunteers. (I'd figured this virus had probably made it to Canada too.) I hope they'll get any bugs worked out in that vaccine soon and it is much more highly publicized and put into use.

Momcat, and anyone else reading or hearing about this, by all means please do pass the word around, and if you find out anything more, please let us all know.

QueenScoopalot, I saw your post in Health and responded there. It looks like you and your kitties went through quite an ordeal. What a nightmare! I'm so glad you all made it.

Emily, thank you very much for the feedback that the vet that had the problems should report them to the FDA and the company. That is just what should be done. I will try and find out from the person who told me this if she knows if the vet did that. Or perhaps I will just call the vet herself.

Thanks again, everyone.

Pat

Thanks Pat for the info. I will ask my vet about this.

Please let us know what your vet says, Sandra.. thanks..

I'm surprised I had never heard about this before, if it's been around since the late 1990s, is as contagious and deadly as they are saying, and until now there was no vaccine for it.

Pat

I did not see this thread sooner and did a search on Calici to find it. I just took Taz to the vet last night for his vaccines and they told me about this. I had not heard of it. I missed this thread or I would have been more informed. I am glad Pat already got it out there (as did someone else sometime back, I think). It sounds very scary. Even though Taz is an indoor only cat, he could still get this nasty virus. :(

The sad thing is that a friend of mine was going into that Burlington Store and adopt a Siamese Mix but she had car problems , and by that time the infected Kitten made all the 8 Ctas so ill that they had to be PTS.
I will have to be very vigilant around the Porch Cats from now on.

I did ask the person who told me about the vet who had the bad reactions of several cats to whom she'd given the new vaccine, if she had reported it to the company. I was told she did, of course, right away.

I haven't heard if she got a response from the company or if anything else has been learned or determined about it.

I still worry about this.

Pat

:eek: Oh my this sounds just Horrible Pat.. I have never heard of it before.. Thanks for the info..

Cindy, what did your vet say about it? Did he/she know about or say anything about the supposed vaccine?

As for the vet who had severe reactions from cats she administered the vaccine to, either she or someone else (a vet tech maybe) later told me they had had previous bad experiences with Fort Dodge, some of their vaccines and/or the company itself, and did not trust either the company or its products.

That is really sad, Gary, about the cats in the Burlington store. Do you know if they closed the place and decontaminated it (see below) after the affected cats were PTS? And did they have others that did not become ill but presumably had been exposed? What happened to those?

Thanks, Helene, I wanted to help spread the word. Please pass it on! I still wonder why this is not more widely seen or at least known about if it is SO contagious and SO fatal.

Cindy and Gary and everyone, from what my vet told me and what I've picked up on line so far, cats who are totally indoor are not necessarily safe from this. The following is paraphrased from what she said and from the UC Davis Vet School's Shelter Medicine program web site
http://www.sheltermedicine.com/porta...tml#prevention:

If you or anyone else in your household or your dog or any other inhabitant who goes in and out so much as brushes up against hair from an infected cat.. it is so highly contagious, you or they could pick it up from that, then carry it back into the house, where your cats will pick it up.

This has been nightmarish at shelters and vet clinics where it has taken hold. Affected animals must be completely isolated (sick animals separately from exposed-but-asymptomatic ones, too), and those caring for them must wear protective covering over clothes and shoes, which must then be removed before handling healthy cats or leaving the facility. Several negative viral cultures must be obtained 1-2 weeks apart to confirm eradication, after which the facility must be thoroughly decontaminated and quarantined for at least TWO WEEKS before allowing entry of cats again.

This site and the ones I listed above also give info on symptoms to watch for.

If I find out anything more, I will let everyone know here (or should I post it under Health?). And if anyone else learns more, please let us all know.

Let's see what we can find out about this and what we can do to keep our precious babies safe... Thanks...

Pat