A group of biologists analyzed almost eight thousand records on the deaths of cats of various breeds in British veterinary clinics and compiled a table on the life expectancy of cats. The authors took into account weight, gender, date of birth, and castration status.
As a species, humans have not lived alone for thousands of years; It is also accompanied by accompanying animals. Nowadays, people keep many animals, from fish to rabbits, from parrots to monkeys. But the main ones are still dogs and cats.
Despite such long-standing friendship between our species (according to some sources, cats were domesticated about ten thousand years ago, and dogs even earlier), man does not know everything about them. Especially life expectancies. Mankind has bred more than a hundred species of domestic cats, and each species has its own biological characteristics. Examining the causes of death in these animals (mostly trauma, genitourinary problems, tumors) and the overall lifespan of different cat breeds can help veterinarians understand their health and risk factors.
For example, in the USA and Japan, life expectancy tables of cats and dogs have already been made, but the fact is that these are different populations with their own genetic reservoirs, where people feed and care for pets differently. For this reason, statistics from one region may not fit well with another. British and Taiwanese biologists decided to compile a table on the life expectancy of cats in Great Britain as a separate population. The results of the research were published in the journal Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery.
The authors worked with cats registered at VetCompass veterinary clinics in 2019. The animal’s card included: species, breed, date of birth, sex, castration status, body weight, and data on treatment if given. Mortality data from these cards were considered between January 2019 and March 2021 (end of study). In total, scientists counted 1,254,484 cats in the population and analyzed 7,936 deaths among them.
It turned out that the life expectancy of women is 1.33 years higher than men (12.51 versus 11.18). In purebred cats, this indicator is one and a half years higher than in purebred cats (11.89 versus 10.41). Burmese and Burmese cats were among the long-lived purebreds; They survived until 14.42 and 14.39 respectively. While purebred cats took the third place, Siamese and Persian cats (11.69 and 10.93 years old, respectively) took the fourth and fifth places. And the shortest lifespan of sphinxes: This breed lives on average up to 6.68 years. Perhaps this is due to the fact that sphinxes are prone to heart diseases.
Castration is an important factor in the health of pets. Cats that did not undergo such operations were 4.29 times more likely to die before the age of three than those that were neutered. Additionally, the risk of death before the age of three was 1.83 times lower in purebred cats than in purebred cats; but there were only 819 of them in the study, the rest were hybridized in one way or another.
Total life expectancy, regardless of gender and race, decreased by 0.02 years for every 100 grams of increase or decrease in body weight. In other words, weight fluctuations were negatively affecting the cats’ health. But at the same time, scientists determined the optimal weight of an animal at 5.5 kilograms; This goes beyond the recommendations of the Association for the Prevention of Obesity in Pets: they set a healthy weight in the range of 3.6-4.5 kilograms.
The results are most representative of Great Britain, as the entire population comes from there. But the new study has other limitations. First, 83.7% of cats were euthanized, underestimating life expectancy. Second, VetCompass clinics were not counting stray cats and those that died at home. Of course, the mortality rates of these animals need to be studied further, but the new data can be used by veterinarians to improve the health of cats.
Source: Port Altele
