Three cats from a single Clackamas County household tested positive for bird flu this week, marking the latest infections across Oregon in the past two months, state officials confirmed Tuesday.
Seven cats in the Portland area have now contracted avian influenza since December, including two others in Washington County and two in Multnomah County. At least four of those cats have been euthanized after developing severe symptoms, according to the Oregon Department of Agriculture.
Most of the infected cats contracted bird flu from raw pet food, according to Ryan Scholz, state veterinarian at the state agency. The disease is more common among poultry, but can spread to other animals through direct contact with infected birds or by consuming infected raw meat or milk.
A spokesperson for the state agency did not confirm whether the three Clackamas County cats had consumed raw pet food prior to their infections.
Bird flu can lead to severe and fatal symptoms. Typical signs of bird flu are fever, difficulty breathing, loss of appetite and eye or nasal discharge. Dogs can also contract the disease but are less susceptible, according to the state agency.
DoveLewis veterinary hospital in Portland said Tuesday it had treated two cats that tested positive for bird flu. One had to be put down, and the other recovered, a spokesperson for the hospital said in a press release. It’s not clear whether these cats are included among the state’s confirmed cases.
Scholz said he expects the number of infections in cats to continue rising. The state agency has ramped up its testing efforts to learn more about the disease’s effects on different animals, Scholz said.
“We are testing a lot of animals,” Scholz said. “We haven’t had any cases in dogs, but it’s certainly possible, and so we’re trying to cast a fairly broad net right now.”
The state agency recommends not feeding pets raw meat or milk. It also advises keeping pets away from wild birds or poultry and washing hands after handling raw meat or interacting with poultry or dead animals.
The Washington State Department of Agriculture has issued a public health alert notifying people of the risk related to products of Wild Coast Raw, an Olympia, Washington-based company. At least two of the bird flu infections in Oregon were tied to this product, officials said.
Prior to the recent wave of infections in cats, Oregon had only two recorded cases of bird flu infecting cats. Both cases occurred in Linn County in 2022, according to agency spokesperson Andrea Cantu-Schomus.
In rare cases, humans can also contract bird flu. However, there have been no reported human infections in Oregon following contact with an infected cat, the agency said.
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