Why Cat Vaccinations in Limerick, PA are Important for Your Pet’s Health
Many people have questions about the reasons for vaccination requirements for pets. There are lots of people who want to know if they really need to vaccinate their pets. This can be a common question if someone has a pet that never leaves the home.
There are some key reasons that cat vaccinations in Limerick, PA are important, even for cats that live entirely indoors. If you have been trying to decide if you want to vaccinate your cat or not, you need to learn some more about the reasons that vaccinations are important. Keeping your cat healthy is critical, and many people do not realize just how important vaccinations are toward that goal.
The Purpose of Cat Vaccines
Vaccines protect your pet from various diseases. There are a wide array of illnesses that cats can share with one another that can be fatal or lead to long-term complications for pets that contract them. Vaccinations make it possible to protect your cat fully or partially against these illnesses.
Even in house cats, there is the possibility of exposure to illnesses that can damage their health or lead to their death. Younger animals have weaker immune systems, and they can be quite fragile if they are not protected from these illnesses and conditions. Vaccines are used to protect their fragile immune systems, and boosters are done to keep the immunity current for their long-term health.
Legal Requirements for Vaccines
In most states, pets of all kinds are required to be vaccinated for rabies. This is a matter of law, although this is usually the only vaccine that is called out in this way. This is to prevent this deadly illness from impacting other pets in your home or you as the owner of the infected animal. Rabies is very serious, and there is not much that can be done if you or your pet contracts this illness.
Legal requirements for indoor pets are the same as outdoor animals, and you should comply with this legal expectation for all your pets.
What Are Some Other Reasons to Vaccinate Cats?
There are other reasons that you should vaccinate your cats. Even if you think that they are not going to be exposed to any other animals or ever leave the home, there are still good reasons to vaccinate your indoor pets.
Protect Your Family
There are some illnesses and diseases that cats can contract that are contagious to people as well. Things like rabies can be transmitted to humans. This is a big reason to make sure that your cat’s vaccinations are current. Even if you do not think that your cat will meet other pets, you do not want them to accidentally make your whole family sick.
Your Cat Gets Out
Cats are known to be escape artists, and there are many situations where a cat slips outside through an unguarded door or an open window. Cats without vaccination immunity can easily get sick while they are away from home, and they might not survive exposure to some of the illnesses and diseases that vaccines protect against.
You Get a New Pet
People often forget that their older pets are not current on their vaccinations and get a new kitten or a new pet of another kind. This new pet might be vaccinated, but that does not provide perfect protection for the older animals whose immunity has fallen off. This is a keyway that serious illnesses and diseases are brought into the home and allowed to impact senior or older animals already in the family.
Senior animals have weaker immune systems, just like kittens, and they can become quite ill from exposure to diseases that come into the home with a younger animal. It is worth keeping your senior pets current on their vaccinations just for a second layer of protection for every pet in the home.
Someone Caring for Your Pets Brings in Illness
While this is less likely, if you ask someone to care for your animals while you are away from home and they have handled a sick animal recently, they can make your unvaccinated pets quite ill. If the person is a vet tech or someone that works at a pet daycare, for example, they are a huge risk for this kind of exposure to your pets in your home.
This is something that many people do not think of, but it can be a serious risk for your pets at home. There are so many ways that diseases can be brought into the home, and this is one of the most common ways that unvaccinated pets get exposed to illness.
Your Pet Goes to the Vet
Your unvaccinated pet might need to go to see the veterinarian at some point. The animal hospital is, by nature, a place where illness can be present. While exam rooms are disinfected between patients, there is always a risk of infection being transmitted to a pet that is not vaccinated.
Your vet will likely warn you about this concern, and you might be required to vaccinate your pet while it is at the animal hospital to be looked at for another reason. There are always disease vectors at the vet, so keeping your pet up to date is important for this reason as well.
Caring For Your Cat Properly Includes Vaccinating Them
If you have been thinking of ways to try and save some money on pet care, cutting out vaccinations is probably not the best bet for your cat’s long-term health. Even if cost is not a factor for you, the health of indoor pets can still be negatively impacted due to unexpected exposures that you cannot prevent. Cat vaccinations are critical to the health of all the pets in your family, as well as for the health of the humans who share their homes.
Is your cat due for vaccinations? Call your Limerick Veterinary Hospital veterinarian at (610) 489-2848 or book an appointment online to help protect your pet!