The Dangers of Ticks in Cats

If you have a cat, you may be familiar with ticks. And you're probably familiar with the many commercials and advertisements that encourage you to purchase products to get rid of ticks or prevent them from feeding on your pet. We place a lot of importance in preventing ticks in our pets because ticks are more than just blood-sucking arachnid parasites; along with mosquitoes, ticks are responsible for transmitting many diseases in cats. Some of these include:

Cytauxzoon. This disease is serious and usually fatal. Caused by a protozoan parasite, affected cats will show signs that include lack of appetite, depression, fever, anemia and jaundice. Most cats diagnosed with Cytauxzoon die within a week.

Relapsing Fever. This is an uncommon disease caused by a bacterial infection of Borrelia. Signs of this disease lead to the common name, intermittent and relapsing fevers, lack of appetite and lethargy.

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