The new virus that attacks the kidneys of cats and could be passed on to their owners
The coronavirus pandemic has perfectly illustrated the risk posed by zoonotic infections. Those who, at a given moment, pass from one species to another by invading wildlife habitat. Regard of a particular type of virus, which attacks cells in the same way as measles.
However, you don’t need to travel to deforested jungles to encounter such threats. Some may be much closer to you.
A viral link
Indeed, its classification as a morbillivirus has been the subject of debate, as it lacks several biological characteristics shared by all other members of its genus. These characteristics led a team from the University of Pittsburgh (USA) to describe its characteristics and pathogenesis, warning in passing that, under certain conditions, this virus could be transmitted to humans.
FeMV causes tract infections urine in cats that often progress to chronic kidney disease.
This is precisely one of the things that makes it special:
Although it uses the same mechanism to infect cells in dogs and cats as other morbilliviruses, its host-to-host mode of transmission (via urine) brings it closer to other viral genera.
Measles gaps
The paradigmatic case, perhaps, is that of measles. It is this fact that makes these authors suspect that the virus can pass to humans.
The bad news is that eliminating measles in some areas may have created an evolutionary niche that allows for similar viruses FeMV to pass to unvaccinated human hosts.
Et the good news is that, precisely because of this similarity, people vaccinated against measles would in principle be protected against FeMV.
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