Cats and dogs may also need to be vaccinated against COVID-19 to help stunt the spread of the infectious disease — amid a threat of the “continued evolution of the virus in animals,” scientists have warned.
Researchers at the University of East Anglia and the Earlham Institute, both in the UK, and the University of Minnesota warned about the “significant long-term risk to public health” from such transmission in an editorial for Virulence.
“It is not unthinkable that vaccination of some domesticated animal species might … be necessary to curb the spread of the infection,” the experts wrote in the peer-reviewed medical journal, the UK’s Independent reported.
While there are no known cases in which a human contracted COVID-19 from a furry family member, Cock van Oosterhout, a professor of evolutionary genetics at UEA in Norwich, said we should prepare “for any eventuality.”
“It makes sense to develop vaccines for pets, for domestic animals, just as a precaution to reduce this risk,” he said. “What we need to be as a human society, we really need to be prepared for any eventuality when it comes to COVID.”
Last year, Denmark was forced to cull millions of mink after hundreds of coronavirus cases in the country were linked to the farmed critters.
If this were to happen with cats and dogs, it would pose “a significant long-term risk to public health,” the editorial warned.
“Continued virus evolution in reservoir animal hosts, followed by spillback events into susceptible human hosts, poses a significant long-term risk to public health,” the group of scientists wrote.
“SARS-CoV-2 can infect a wide range of host species, including cats, dogs, mink and other wild and domesticated species and, hence, the vaccination of domesticated animals might be required to halt further virus evolution and spillback events.”
The scientists added: “Whilst the vaccination campaigns against SARS-CoV-2/Covid-19 are being rolled out worldwide, new virus variants are likely to continue to evolve that have the potential to sweep through the human population.”
Meanwhile, the group is also calling on governments to continue enforcing strict control measures, such as mask mandates and social distancing orders, to reduce the evolution and spread of any new COVID variants.
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January 26, 2021 at 12:43AM
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Cats and dogs may need COVID vaccines to curb spread, scientists say - New York Post
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