I may be making a crazy statement here, but I had a thought last week: If rescues want people to adopt more FIV+ cats and really and truly want to educate the public that an FIV+ diagnosis is not the end of the world, then I think they s...
I may be making a crazy statement here, but I had a thought last week: If rescues want people to adopt more FIV+ cats and really and truly want to educate the public that an FIV+ diagnosis is not the end of the world, then I think they should start practicing what they preach.
In the rescue world, everyone is working hard lately to educate potential adopters about FIV+ cats -- and this is a great thing! It’s not big deal, we say. FIV+ cats can mix and mingle with other cats, and as long as neither is super aggressive, there is very little risk of them passing it on. They can live long, happy lives, and they're pretty much otherwise perfect.
And yet, most rescues will not accept FIV+ cats, and the ones that do (thank you for that much, at least!), keep them separated in an “FIV room” with other positive kitties.
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Me super-cuddling Berger, a sweet FIV+ kitty.
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So how in the world are assumedly uneducated adopters supposed to accept these cats into their homes if rescues segregate them from other cats? It’s a touchy situation, and one that might initially be hard to accept -- and even harder to put into practice.
The fact is that FIV is not easily transmittable. I say this when describing the risk factor: “Unless both cats are wild lions and tigers and get into a violent fur-flying skin-shredding attacks, you’ll most likely be okay.” Rescues know this, too.
I won’t go into the specifics about feline immunodeficiency virus (but you can read all about it here), but I will say that there is a lot of misconceptions about it. If cats test positive in an animal control shelter, for instance, they will most likely be euthanized on the spot. It’s not because they are “sick,” but because they are harder to adopt because of these misconceptions.
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Big orange cat and little orange kitten by Shutterstock.com.">
Big orange cat and little orange kitten by Shutterstock.com.">
We can be friends, right? Big orange cat and little orange kitten by Shutterstock.com.
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FIV+ cats can be adopted into homes with negative cats. It’s all about temperament, really. For instance, one of my cats is the calmest, sweetest boy ever. I know he’d be a great match for a calm FIV cat. Neither one of them would present any danger of scratching or biting the other.
So here’s my point: If rescues want people to believe this (because it is true!), then maybe that’s where the example-setting should start. Perhaps someone might be more inclined to adopt an FIV+ cat if they see how well he is interacting with other cats and everything is fine. Maybe if they weren’t so segregated at rescues or shunned at shelters, they’d have more a chance of being more widely accepted.
Imagine if you see a super-sweet kitty at the rescue. He’s the best one. He rubs your hand and rubs the cat scratcher and rubs his buddies and decides he wants you to take him home. It’s love at first sight, and you tell them you’d like to adopt him. And then they tell you he’s FIV+.
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Little girl with pet cat by Shutterstock.com.">
Little girl with pet cat by Shutterstock.com.">
Dreaming of a day when FIV kitties always get to live the good life... Little girl with pet cat b
