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Old June 18th 15, 07:12 PM posted to rec.pets.cats.health+behav
Mack A. Damia
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Default New study links schizophrenia to cat ownership

On Thu, 18 Jun 2015 13:45:13 -0400, Rhino
wrote:

On 2015-06-18 6:13 AM, whisky-dave wrote:

If you've not heard.


http://www.alphr.com/science/1000973...-cat-ownership

The other voice in my head doesn't agree.


Approximately 50 percent of the people who later had schizophrenia had
cats around when they were children. That might seem significant at
first but I'm guessing that a much higher percentage of eventual
schizophrenics had exposure to hot dogs or peanut butter or
electromagnetic radiation as kids. Wouldn't those things be more likely
the culprit than cats?

Scientists express this sort of reasoning succinctly with the
observation that "correlation is not the same as causation".

As far as I known T.gondi has not been shown to cause schizophrenia. I
believe the cause(s) of schizophrenia remain entirely unknown. Someday
we will, I hope, figure out the cause of schizophrenia and that will
help us figure out how to prevent it, assuming it can be prevented. In
the meantime, accept that we don't know and avoid persecuting cats just
on the suspicion that they may be involved.


It's a weird thing. Reports claim that about 50% of the population
carry T.gondii. Appently, it's not just schizophrenia but depression
and anxiety as well. This thing may have altered entire cultures.

I also read that pregnant women should not handle litter boxes.

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