Some adult humans can drink milk without symptoms because of a mutation to a gene that never sends out the signal to turn off the lactase-making ability at about the age of weaning.
I thought this was unique to humans. But an article in the Hamilton Spectator says that cats are more similar to people than we thought:
Is this true? Can anyone provide me any cites on this?
My adult silver tabby (not pedigree) drinks milk and doesn’t appear to be suffering any effects…
I’ve never heard that. If you google “cats lactose intolerant” you’ll find tons of site supporting the fact that cats are generally lactose intolerant (and are more often lactose intolerant than humans). Like humans though, the level of lactose intolerance can vary, so some cats can consume some dairy with few noticeable effects. My one cats gets very gassy, but that’s about it.
Wikipedia mentions the “mutation” near the bottom of their page on lactose intolerance:
But it doesn’t have a cite or footnote either. I’d be curious to see that too.
Tolerance of cow’s milk is certainly not universal among American cats. I rescued a stray who got the runs from cow’s milk even at 10 weeks.
I really do not want to know what may have caused that mutation to jump from humans to cats! :eek: