Both vaccination and deworming are very important factors in the prevention of health of our animals. Vaccination, in particular, protects them from diseases that can be fatal and that we often do not know about. That is why knowing the vaccination guidelines for cats and respecting them is so important.
Vaccinate our cats it helps protect their health, that is why it is important that they follow the vaccination program since they are puppies. To that end and others on which your health will depend, the ideal is to visit a veterinarian as soon as we open our home to a new member. Because nobody better than a veterinarian to advise them and bring our cat up to date.
Essential vaccines
Essential vaccines are those recommended for all cats and kittens, regardless of their lifestyle. When they are born, kittens are protected by the antibodies that their mother transmits to them through colostrum. However, there comes a time when these antibodies are not enough to protect them and vaccination is essential for infections.
Thus, the first vaccines should be received in the first months of life. But what vaccines are we talking about?
- Trivalent Feline: The Trivalent vaccine protects the cat from Feline Parvovirus (Panleukopenia), an often fatal viral infection, Calicivirus and Herpesvirus (feline viral rhinotracheitis). The periodicity with which it must be applied is annual.
- Quadrivalent: To the above is added that of the Feline leukemia, a condition that suppresses the immune system, making the cat extremely vulnerable to other diseases.
The tetravalent is especially necessary in those cats with access to the outside as can rabies if there is still a risk of contracting it in the area. Depending on the place where we live and the way of life of our cats, the veterinarian will know how to advise us if they are necessary and how often it is necessary to put them.
Non-essential vaccines
Non-essential or non-basic vaccines, as they are also called, are those that are recommended according to the risk of exposure of our cat to a specific disease or virus. This exhibition will be influenced by both the place of residence and the fact that the cat goes outside or lives with other cats.
The vaccines that in these cases are usually recommended with the following:
- Feline Infectious Peritonitis (FIP). This disease is caused by a mutation of a fairly common virus called calicivirus. Due to a failure of the immune system of the cat in question and not due to the virus itself, which usually goes unnoticed. The efficacy of the vaccine is not very high, so sometimes veterinarians do not even mention it.
- Rage: As long as the animal does not live in an area where rabies exists or where this vaccine is required, it is not necessary to apply it. However, your vet may recommend vaccinating him. In Spain, it is only not compulsory today in the Basque Country, Galicia and Catalonia.
An undemanding schedule
As you can see, the vaccination schedule for cats is not demanding at all. In case of adoptionThe usual thing is that cats are delivered in the protectors with the trivalent on and the corresponding deworming. You can ask it in the different interviews and check it in the booklet that will be given to you along with the cat and the adoption papers. Remember when you go to adopt him and before complaining about the price of signing an adoption contract that the protector has had to pay these expenses. In addition, of course, to all the derivatives of their maintenance and health problems during the time that the cat has been with them.
Keeping up with vaccinations and deworming will not be complicated, even less if you receive the alerts that veterinarians offer as a service nowadays and that in the form of a mobile alert or a call inform you of the next deworming or vaccine. They can't make it easier for us.