Who are “they”?
I’m going to define “them”. “They” are the group who don’t want cat owners to know what’s up with the bird flu. “They” make money misdirecting the public. “They” were very likely involved in making dog owners think grain free kibble caused heart disease AKA DCM (dilated cardiomyopathy).
“They” make a lot of money selling cat food. I mean A LOT.
There are 88 million pet cats in the US. There are almost 350 million pet cats in the world.
“They” own 75% of the pet food industry – not just the US, but in the world.
Using US prices, the average cat owner feeds a can of food and a bunch of dry daily. A can costs $1.50 (I’m talking regular grocery store cat food.) Let’s just use easy numbers and say the average US cat owner spends $2 a day a cat. That means $176 million of cat food is used daily in the US. ($700M worldwide.) Daily.
“They” want to keep making this money.
“They” don’t like knowing that 4% of cat owners feed their cats raw food – because that is $7M a day out of their pocket book – just in the US. ($28M worldwide. Daily)
So “they” will capitalize on anything that convinces cat owners to spend more money on “their” food.
Fortunately for “them” bird flu is here.
Bird flu affects, well, birds. But, unfortunately, some cats also get sick from bird flu. Based on published data from the USDA over the last 4 years, we know that 610 cats in the US have been infected with the flu. And 5 of the infected cats ate raw food. This is significantly less than 4%. (It would have been 24 cats if it were straight math – 24 is 4% of the 610 infected.)
Ok.
Heavy math.
Breathe.
I’m not trying to overwhelm you with the math. But what “they” don’t want cat owners to understand is that cats eating regular food are 5 times MORE likely to get bird flu than cats who eat raw!
Whoa. That’s not what “they” are saying in “their” news stories! Right?
We don’t know all the reasons why. But we have good math.
But “they” instead are publishing headlines that bird flu is coming back and more cats who eat raw food are going to die.
This really yanks my chain.
Because I’m very worried about all cats. AND 99% OF BIRD FLU CASES IN CATS ARE DUE TO GOING OUTSIDE.
“They” don’t want you to know that. “They” want you distracted and talking bad about other styles of food.
Oh
By the way…
Did you know that “they” own thousands of veterinary clinics and emergency centers worldwide? “They” own 15% of all veterinary hospitals in the US.
So by misdirecting you, more cats will get the flu. More cats will be sick. More cats will go to “their” veterinary hospitals. “They” will make more money.
Please don’t “feed the machine”. Please don’t believe the misdirection.
Cats get sick from bird flu by being outside and hunting birds. Flu season has started. It’s here.
Please protect your cats.
Still seeing patients in Tampa, Clearwater, and virtually.