We don’t know if there can be cat to human transmission. But I suspect it is likely to eventually be confirmed. This has obvious implications about being a issue for breaking transmission chains in the domestic cat world (and of course for humans).
Covid-19 confirmed in cats: After months of speculation and anecdotal cases, scientists have confirmed that domestic cats can become infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, and can pass the virus to other cats. The results of their laboratory study on cats were published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday.
Medium Coronavirus Blog
Three domestic cats were inoculated with SARS-CoV-2 on day 0. One day after inoculation, a cat with no previous SARS-CoV-2 infection was cohoused with each of the inoculated cats to assess whether transmission of the virus by direct contact would occur between the cats in each of the three pairs (Table S1 in the Supplementary Appendix, available with the full text of this letter at NEJM.org). Nasal and rectal swab specimens were obtained daily and immediately assessed for infectious virus on VeroE6/TMPRSS2 cells.3
On day 1, we detected virus from two of the inoculated cats. By day 3, virus was detectable in all three inoculated cats, with continued detection of virus until day 5 in all cats and until day 6 in two of the three cats (Figure 1).
The cats with no previous infection were cohoused with the inoculated cats on day 1. Two days later (day 3), one of the cats with no previous infection had infectious virus detected in a nasal swab specimen, and 5 days later, virus was detected in all three cats that were cohoused with the inoculated cats (Figure 1). Virus titers in the cats that were cohoused with the inoculated cats peaked at 4.5 log10 plaque-forming units per milliliter, and virus shedding lasted 4 to 5 days (Figure 1). No virus was detected in any of the rectal swabs tested. Although there have been reports of symptomatic infected cats, none of the cats in our study showed any symptoms, including abnormal body temperature, substantial weight loss (Fig. S1), or conjunctivitis. All the animals had IgG antibody titers between 1:5120 and 1:20,480 on day 24 after the initial inoculation
New England Journal of Medicine
Other feline species like lions and tigers have been confirmed with being able to be infected by humans at the Bronx zoo. This was discovered by testing after several tigers and lions showed signs of a respiratory illness. See CDC bulletin.
For humans, our daily contact with our cute carnivore masters should probably be done with a bit of caution. If your master starts getting a respitory disease, it will be worth telling your vet that as a precaution.
While there have also been reports of dogs being infected as well. But so far I haven’t seen any reports of research on that. But basically who really cares?
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