Feline-phobia? Save your relationship today!

I am a feline-doting kind of girl. They kill rodents, purr to cheer me up and add to economy by requiring expensive dry cleaning of daily work wear. Luckily for me, I managed to find a cat-loving companion in my life. Some of you out there are probably not so fortunate. Some members of our society are apparently cat-a-phobes and cat-haters. I’ll grant you that some cats have been known to kill birds, incite satanic rituals and elicit human allergies but on a whole, they are fun loving bundles of fur.

So what to do when you realize your intended partner refuses to give up his phobia about Fluffy? Modern science can now come to rescue. A treatment based on several basic drug discovery principles is just an undercooked meal away.

We spend about $30 million dollars a year on NIH sponsored research so something good for everyone should arise from all this funding. Well, we do now know that the parasite Toxoplasma gondii – aka TOXO – can provide lasting relief for your cat-avoiding boyfriend. In rodents and in chimpanzees, chronic infections with this microbe reduce the fear of cats and allow much closer interactions between species. This behavior is evolutionarily geared towards increasing the parasites survival by allowing uninterrupted lifecycles from vectors to hosts and back again, but we can use it to our advantage. These studies also provide the required “proof of concept” needed to demonstrate efficacy of this clandestine therapy. Human safety studies, disguised as psychological testing, have only shown a very slight increase in possible suicide attempts with chronic infections, not obnoxious conditions like poor impulse control. So just watch your fellow closely, but of course you already do that.

TOXO invades every known mammalian cell type and is spread to humans through infected undercooked meats and exposure to infected Fluffy litter boxes. I’m not suggesting that you drop the steak into a litter box but hey you are going to cook it, right? This is the final principle of targeted therapies, administration of the test article - really who came up with that awful name for a preclinical drug anyway? Initial infections are generally mild, giving you and Fluffy lots of quality caregiver time while you calmly wait for the love to flow.

I hope you find this effective at dealing with the annoying problem of being forced to exclude your sweet, clawed fur ball from your bedroom. And no – it’s not an approved FDA treatment for cat hating, just an observation based on actual science.

Happiness is a warm fuzzy kitten.