Can You Keep a Cat During Pregnancy?

1 Keeping a Cat During Pregnancy

In the older generation’s mindset, pregnancy and cat-keeping seem mutually exclusive. Parents just say cats are bad for the fetus without much explanation. For a married owner, this is worth exploring deeply with one’s partner!

The ‘no cats during pregnancy’ belief ultimately comes down to a parasite called Toxoplasma. Pregnant women infected with toxoplasma can indeed face premature birth, miscarriage, and fetal abnormalities! Poor cats have taken the blame for so long~

Toxoplasma is an intracellular parasite that travels with the blood to all parts of the body and damages the brain and heart, lowering the infected person’s immunity and causing various diseases.

Most people show no obvious symptoms after infection; only children and immunocompromised people may worsen. Simply put, it bullies the weak!

Toxoplasma’s developmental stages include tachyzoites, cysts, merozoites, gametocytes, and oocysts. Merozoites, gametocytes, and oocysts appear only in the definitive host (felines), while tachyzoites and cysts exist in intermediate hosts like pigs, cattle, and sheep; oocysts can also be in flies and cockroaches!

So humans mainly get toxoplasma from food – eating raw meat, or products from infected animals like milk and eggs. The rest is basically hygiene.

Based on daily habits, preventing toxoplasma for both people and cats comes down to diet and hygiene.

Have your own cat get regular checkups and deworming

Watch the cat’s diet and avoid raw meat

Don’t let the cat roam outside to avoid contact with infected animals

Clean cat feces daily; toxoplasma oocysts become infectious only 2-4 days after being passed in feces

Limit the cat’s range and avoid close contact between cat and pregnant woman and contact with her belongings

Get a toxoplasma serum test before pregnancy

Never let the expectant mother handle cat hygiene; leave it to others

For personal hygiene, wash hands often, especially after handling cat waste and before meals

In diet, avoid unpasteurized dairy and raw meat

In summary, you can keep a cat during pregnancy, but parents are not entirely wrong – infection risk remains. So if you keep a cat while pregnant, be very careful and it’s also important to gain your parents’ support!