----- Original Message ----- From: "Belinda Sauro" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Wednesday, December 08, 2004 1:26 PM Subject: Re: contagiousness of FELV and other thoughts.../strain
> So what your trying to say in plain english is, any cat infected with > FeLV-A that doesn't convert to negative will eventually develop it's own > strain of FeLV unique to it, which is then called FeLV-B? What causes > the FeLV-A's recombination into a FeLV-B or FeLV-C sequence? What > causes this to happen in some and not others if they remain positive? Wow! Is that how you interpreted what I wrote? That's really interesting! Let me try again. All FeLV-infected cats are infected with FeLV-A which is transmitted contagiously among cats. The FeLV-A subgroup is *always* present in viremic cats. But only about 50% of the cats infected with FeLV-A will generate FeLV-B, and only about 1% will generate FeLV-C. Are you with me so far? FeLV-A is slow to cause disease by itself. When disease does occur, its usually the result of FeLV-induced immunosuppression and opportunistic pathogens. FeLV-B occurs in about 50% of all FeLV-infected cats and causes more neoplastic disease (i.e., tumors and other abnormal tissue growths) than cats infected only with FeLV-A. FeLV-C occurs in about 1% of FeLV-infected cats and causes severe anemia. This is why the outcome of the disease is different in different cats, and why some cats develop neoplastic disease and/or severe anemia and others don't. Cats infected with only FeLV-A can live a long time after infection providing they're kept healthy (other than FeLV). Ok? ;-) Ong
