This is often a common question I’ve been asked over many years of clinical veterinary practice. Most of the time if families practice good hygiene, such as washing their hands after disposing of fecal material (from the litter box or in the yard), and minimizing pets licking them in the face, zoonotic diseases can indeed be often prevented. Individuals like pregnant women should avoid handling litter box materials or fecal material to prevent the potential rare exposure to toxoplasmosis. Toxoplasmosis is an illness that human physician’s often over scare pet owners about in regards to the actual risk of the household cat to its pet owners.
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Clients are many times over concerned about the transmission of common intestinal worms in puppies and kittens like roundworms, hookworms, and tapeworms. However, by educating everyone in the family on proper hygiene and the washing of hands, transmission is indeed rare. When infants are around, it’s important to monitor them closely to avoid direct contact with animal feces, which can prevent the very rare transmission of these parasites to babies. Other potential risks to humans such as parasites like Giardia, can be prevented through a good clean home and yard care. |
Most monthly heartworm preventative medications like Heartgard Plus, Interceptor, and Iverheart also contain ingredients that control and prevent many of these worms. As a result, year-round use of heartworm medications in both dogs and cats can help minimize intestinal parasite risk to humans, as well as preventing the spread of heartworm infection in dogs and cats.
Another category of diseases that poses risks to people includes the diseases fleas, ticks and mosquitoes. Among the most common diseases resulting from fleas, tick, or mosquitoes include Bartonella in cats (often transmitted by fleas), the West Nile Virus (transmitted by mosquitoes but seen in higher numbers in horses than people or dogs), and the largest group transmitted by ticks includes Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Ehrlichiosis, and Babesia. In my opinion, the recent media coverage given to the “emerging disease” in dogs that may pose a risk to people, such as leptospirosis, is extremely exaggerated and has been given a name by one well respected veterinary immunologist as “leptomania.” This means that the risk of this disease to people from animals is no greater than it was decades ago.
However, by using flea and tick control products such as Advantix, Frontline Plus, Advantage, or more natural products (containing various essential oils) pet owners can play a significant role in minimizing their own risk of infection. Regular grooming and flea combing of pets can also help in this regard, by lessening the amount of dander and allergens on the coats of pets that can cause nagging allergies in people.
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[...] many of the more common diseases potentially transmitted from animals to people, otherwise known as zoonotic diseases. In the recent veterinary literature, I have been reading even more articles on the role fleas [...]