Did I do the right thing with this cat?

Recently, I humanely trapped a stray cat in the neighborhood. I brought him to the vet, and told the vet that, if the cat tested negative for feline AIDS(not transferable to humans, by the way, only to other cats), and feline leukemia, that I would pay to have him neutered, etc., and adopt him. I do have other cats, but the stray I am talking about had a nice disposition, so I thought he would be o.k. with the other cats after they got used to him-I have done this before, and it always worrked out quite well.Anyway, this cat tested positive for Feline Aids, and also had a wound which in itself was treatable, but his having it meant transmission of the disease to other cats could happen quite easily. I had two choices:have the cat neutered, which the vet would have done for peanuts, by the way-though cost did not matter to me-and return him to the neighborhood to live out his life out of doors until he died of AIDS, or have him euthanized. I chose euthanasia. Did I do the right thing?

Additional info to possibly help you in answering my question:over the years, I have live-trapped a total of 17 strays and ferals in my neighborhood. Some of them ended up going to good homes, even very recently, because their tests were negative, and their dispositions were good. Three of the cats, this one being one of them, did test positive for AIDS. The test, by the way, is very accurate. All three of the FIV-positive cats were unaltered males who were either at the top of the hierarchy in the cat colony, or had been at one time. None of the others were, or had ever been, even close to the top of the pecking order. Of the 14 healthy cats, seven are males, and the remaining seven are females.

aww you did. I understand where you are coming from and its not an easy decision to make on your own.

I think that was a really very brave of you to do that for him.
So dont feel bad about it.

Im very proud of what you did and it was the right thing to do. Nobody els would have done it though. And i cant picture a poor stray cat begging for food. That would have been more cruel than having him euthanized and letting him suffer and infecting other cats.

Well done... I wouldnt have been able to do that.

Hop you feel much better;)

First of all, we all make difficult choices, and you chose what you thought was best for it, so don't feel badly. The cat had AIDS so it might have been best to have it euthanized, anyway. I think you made the right decision.

YES. You prevented the cat from suffering, and more importantly from transmitting diseases to any other cats. I'm sure it was a hard decision and you feel bad about doing it, but it was the right thing to do.

Had to do quick read. Q. was to long anyway answer. Yes!

Euthanasia or not is a difficult choice to make. If you felt you saved the cat from suffering, which it appears you did from your question, I think you made the correct choice. It doesn't appear the cat would have had a very good quality of life, so I think you did the humane thing.

The feline leukemia is very contagious to other cats.. I think you did the right thing.. as hard as it was for you to make that decision.... Many years ago I had a male cat.... the best cat I ever had... he got the feline leukemia, developed really bad peritonitis and swelling of his belly and I had it drained twice (needle aspiration), and he was really just pretty miserable so I finally had to put him down...

You saved this cat a life of suffering on the streets without a home and saved other cats from coming in to contact with the disease.

So, not only did you do the poor little guy a favor, you did the other kitties a favor also....

That was really nice of you to bring him in to the vet.... You sound like a good cat mom!!

ok this is just my opinion but NO i dont think you did the right thing.
FIV is not a death sentence and once a cat is neutered there is only a small chance of it passing on the virus to other cats.
FIV positive cats can lead a normal and long life.

I know this isnt want you wanted to hear but the more people understand about FIV the better. So many people think an FIV cat should be euthanized but this isnt the case. So i know its too late this time but at least you will know if this ever happens again. FIV cats deserve to have a chance at life

I would happily have an FIV cat living with my cats as the risk of passing it on is low.


mercedes ,
this cat had FIV not FeLV (leukemia)

yes unless you were going to be able to keep that cat in a one cat household and make sure it never went outside again, you could never make certain that he did not continue to spread the disease. If living outside was his only option, you saved many other cats by your decision.

You definitely did the right thing. You wouldn't want the cat spreading the AIDS to other cats in the neighborhood. It was probably best for him, anyways - dying of feline AIDS can't be pleasant.

you probably helped out the feral cat situation, as well.

yes i think you did the right thong because now the cat wont suffer and wont be able to spred aids to other cats

I think that your a very good and kind person to have taken all the cats you have and for taken the time to do what you did with the other cat. You had a difficult choice to make as one of the answerer's said already and Yes I think you did make the right decision! I mean you couldn't have brought him home with you to the other cats. It would be very difficult to look for a home for him and he probably would have ended up been left a stray untreated in the wild and God knows probably in Pain from having Aids (because his immune system would have been low!). At least he died peacefully and he's not going to be going around suffering and you worrying about him, wondering if he's okay!

You absolutely did the right thing. I know it was a hard decision; I had to put a darling cat down due to feline leprosy, so I completely understand where you are coming from. But you did the best thing for the cat; not what was good for you, or what would make you feel better but what was good for the cat. The other option was that the cat could potentially pass it to other cats, and that it would slowly become ill over time, have a harder time recovering from other injuries and illnesses, and what kind of life is that?
I would have made the same decision. You have saved a lot of lives with this decision. The other cats it may have infected, and really, you also saved it from a life of suffering.

I think it was the best thing for the cat too. Please don't torture yourself wondering whether it was the right decision or not, I think you sound like a very good person, and the fact is that you did what you did because YOU believed it was right. There was no malice behind your choice, you were simply trying to save this poor kitty from living a life of suffering and also saving other cats in the neighbourhood from getting sick. You are a good person and although it was a difficult decision to have made, I think you made the right one for all the right reasons. :-)

I think you did the right thing. You had a tough decision to make about an animal that wasn't really your pet. It was sick- so any other cat it came in contact with would easily have contracted feline AIDS. It was inevitable that he would have died, and likely a slow painful death. As hard as your choice was, for the cat population and his own health, it was a good choice. I commend you for taking strays to the vet and having them fixed. I wish more people would/could do what you did.

I think you did the right thing. Anytime you make the decision for euthanasia you wonder afterwards if you made the right decision.

Yes you did do the right thing! You have propably saved many more cats lives so they don't get feline aids either and have to suffer. Also you helped this stray cat by not letting him suffer. He was going to pass away anyways because of the AIDS but you let him pass away without suffering and painlessly.

Not to make you feel bad, but I see cats with FIV every day and they are not suffering (I work in a no-kill feline shelter.) They are also adopted into many loving homes (usually ones with no other felines in the household.) My friend also had a cat that was outdoor and contracted FIV, but he lived a pleasent life indoors after they got the test results. In the future, see if there is a shelter that takes such animals into their care and if so, take it to them (they usually spay or neuter the animal through their orginization.) We gladly accept animals from all walks in life. (We keep FIV felines seperate from the other cats in case you were wondering.) I'm not saying what you did was wrong, I don't want you to think that. Certaintly it would not have been wise to continue allowing it to wander outdoors being a potential threat to other cats. But now you know you may have other options in the future in case this situation were to arise again. Perhaps there is no place where it would have been accepted. Then you would have had no choice, I would agree.

There's several answers to your question.

If anyone vaccinated that cat against FIV he'd be testing positive all his life for FIV because he's got the antibodies to it due to the vaccine. The vaccine has been on the market for over 3 years now and it's causing perfectly healthy cats to be immediately euthenized at animal shelters all over the USA.

If you had the vet do the quickie blood test where you get results in 15 minutes (it tests for FIV and FeLV) that one is called the Elisha test and it's got a known failure rate of 30% on FIV. With FeLV it's accurate, but out of 100 healthy cats who are given this test 30 will come up as having FIV when they don't. This test is NOT accurate and any results for FIV from it should be treated as a 'maybe' only and the Western Blot test should be done. One startling test done last year on the efficiency of the Elisha test on known healthy cats who did not have FIV had a horrendously high rate of 70% come up as having FIV (when they did not have it). This test shouldn't even be used, in my opinion.

The Western Blot is the only test I'd trust. It's done by having a blood sample sent out to a lab and they look at the actual factors in the blood. The test is 96% accurate or higher, so you can trust it.

Did you do the right thing? Personally I don't think so. I've got two former stray tom cats who are FIV positive and the disease is not known to pass easily without biting involved. There's been no tests that came up showing this disease passes by mutual grooming, using the same litter or food bowls, or even roughhousing. My three non-FIV cats have not picked up FIV from our two FIV guys in 10 years and they're together 24/7 (I just had blood tests done on them for tooth work). The FIV groups on yahoogroups are full of owners who mix their FIV positives and negatives and have had no transmission of the disease because the cats were not aggressive.

A FIV cat can live over 15 years with the disease--the only way it's a death sentence is if a vet recomends automatic euthenasia. So much new info is available in the past 10 years on FIV, I'd hope all vets would keep abreast of the new info, but sadly many do not.