Cats and dogs may also need to be vaccinated against COVID-19 to help stunt the spread of the infectious disease — amid a threat of the “continued evolution of the virus in animals,” scientists have warned.
Researchers at the University of East Anglia and the Earlham Institute, both in the UK, and the University of Minnesota warned about the “significant long-term risk to public health” from such transmission in an editorial for Virulence.
“It is not unthinkable that vaccination of some domesticated animal species might … be necessary to curb the spread of the infection,” the experts wrote in the peer-reviewed medical journal, the UK’s Independent reported.
While there are no known cases in which a human contracted COVID-19 from a furry family member, Cock van Oosterhout, a professor of evolutionary genetics at UEA in Norwich, said we should prepare “for any eventuality.”