A metanalysis of 11 studies over 44 years concluded that owning cats doubles the chances of the owners having schizophrenia-related disorders. https://www.sciencealert.com/myster...ing-cats-and-schizophrenia-is-real-study-says
Quote from link ... "This kind of research cannot prove cause and effect..." Maybe people who have schizophrenic tendencies choose cats as pets. (See Spurious Correlation thread.)
Or like all relationships, sometimes one partner takes on the characteristics of the other. I wonder if the number of cats a person has increases or decreases the schizophrenia.
I think if Ken took his cats with him on his road trips or when he does his walkabout to his camp, there’d definitely be some room for real concern. Although…..he does spend an awful lot of time all by himself locked in a small room with his computer. I’ll have to consult with Dr. Sigmond Google about that.
I have no doubt our kitties help keep us sane, probably more so than any other single factor in our lives, love the little fuzzballs.
Isn’t sanity a matter of subjectivity? I mean, I am pretty sure that I’m perfectly sane but there is no doubt that there are a few folks who would argue the point.
Apparently, this is not the only parasite that involves cats and other animals or humans. I was just listening to a video by Dr. Gundry, and he explains about a parasite (unpronounceable/spellable name) that a cat can get, and then it is in the urine. If a rat somehow ingests something that has this parasite in it, then the parasite can take over the rat brain so that the rat now wants cat urine, or to be near a cat, leading it to be eaten by the cat. If a monkey gets this parasite, then it is no longer afraid of a tiger (remember those youtube videos of that monkey pulling the tiger’s tail ?), and even wolves can get it because their main predator happens to be mountain lions. An interesting fact is that the parasite makes the animal or person less afraid, and he said that many people who have become what we call super heroes have that parasite. So, maybe it is not all bad ? If you want to learn more, it is the first thing that Dr. Gundry talks about (and I thought the most interesting) in this video, so it only takes a minute to watch the part about the cat parasite.
I hope that @Ken Anderson knows that I was just joshing with him. My son is a cat person, and he is the sanest person I know. (Present company excepted, of course.) He had three cats, but he didn't go looking for them. They were sort of sent to him. The first one, ....... We have a wooded area behind our houses. He was back there doing something and heard a kitten mewing. He investigated and found a tiny kitten. Someone must have dumped it back there. He could have left it to die but being the kindhearted person that his mother raised him to be, he brought her to his house and took care of her. She lived a long and happy life. The second one,..... His wife got to work one day and there was a tiny part Siamese kitten in the parking lot. I think someone who raised Siamese kittens to sell had let the mama cat get impregnated by a stray cat. Because he wasn't "pure", they dumped the kittens out in the parking lot thinking someone would rescue them. So, my son, like kindhearted Ken, took the kitten in. He lived a long happy life. I can't remember how he got the other one. They all lived a life of luxury until they died. He has a pet cemetery in his back yard with markers for each one.
I took a parasitology class and was AMAZED at the adaptations of certain parasites to the manipulation of their host and even its environment. There was one micro-organism, name long since forgotten, that had a life cycle involving three different hosts. It started by parasitizing a small snail which was one of the food sources of a particular fish. The fish was dark colored on top to match the murky waters but had a bright silvery belly. When the fish ate the parasitized snail, the parasite then infected the fish and modified its behavior. Infected fish soon started doing loops, ventral side up, essentially flashing their bellies at the surface. This in turn made them easy prey for certain birds. The birds ate the infected fish and the parasite was given a lift to a whole new aquatic environment by first class air. The bird droppings at the new site were a source of infection for the snails there and the cycle repeated. Absolutely incredible. This one parasite had a significant impact on a number of types of organisms that thrived and perished in their environment.