Feline Immunodeficiency Virus (FIV) In Your Cat

Feline Immunodeficiency Virus is a slow virus that might affect your cat. FIV affected cats can be found worldwide and an infected cat can appear normal for years and might appear to be very healthy, because FIV affects the cat very slowly. FIV affects the entire cat family and found in a big cat species all over the world.


The FIV may be compared to the HIV (Human immunodeficiency Virus) in Human beings. The both are same in the way, they are transmitted and the way they affect the body of the sick. But the FIV affects the cats much more slowly than the HIV in humans. The FIV infections are seen more in the cats and an infected cat can live many years healthy without any major symptoms of its sickness.

Transmission of these viruses takes place through scratches and bites and casual non-aggressive contacts will not help in transmission of these viruses. The Virus may also be present in the cat’s vagina, rectum and mouth. But sexual contact is not a major means of transmission of FIV and on some rare occasions, the infection can be transmitted from an infected mother cat to its kitten.

The Disease affects the cats in three stages: The Acute stage, The Subclinical stage and the chronic stage. The acute stage occurs immediately after a virus enters into a cat’s body. In this stage, the cat experiences fever and depression. After surviving this stage, the second stage, Subclinical affects the cat, where the cat appears to be normal and healthy for a long period. At the final and last chronic stage, the cat suffers severely from the effect of the disease. The disease affects the immune system and the cat develops several non-related diseases. The disease causes an immense immune deficiency in the body of the cats that hinders the cat’s ability to protect itself from other infections. Hence the cat is affected by various bacteria, viruses and protozoa which normally do not affect healthy animals and causes serious illness.

Even though the household cats can live many years even after infecting from FIV without any treatment, it is better to give your pet a proper treatment for its infection. A new treatment technique was released and sold through Imulan Bio Therapeutics in 2006. LLC has been developed to counter some of the internal symptoms of this disease and prevent this disease at its early stages. You can give some nutritional food and balanced diet to your cats in order to prevent the disease from spreading rapidly.

As Years passes by, these cats have developed a certain resistance to the disease. But to make sure whether your cat has been infected by FIV or not, consult a veterinarian in our area.