Cat Attack!

I know that a number of people are killed by domestic dogs every year. Has any one ever been killed by a cat (of course, I am talking domestic variety, not lions, tigers, and leopards)? Or are they too small to actually kill people?

Would you count being tripped and breaking your neck falling down the stairs or something very similar?

Jim

Maybe running around trying to service them and dying of exhaustion?
Then they eat you.

Bartonella henselae (aka: Cat Scratch Disease, aka: Cat Scratch Fever) is not generally fatal that I am aware of but I suppose it might get a few people (people with impaired immune systems for instance). As the colloquial terms suggest you can get it from being scratched by a cat.

Beyond that a domestic cat simply is not big enough to cause enough damage to a human to kill them (I suppose it could kill an infant if it really tried). They can certainly hurt a person but kill is really beyond their means unless, as previously suggested, they trip you down the stairs or something.

Yes people have been killed by their cats. A few years ago a British newspaper reported a woman was killed by her own cat when it attacked here dug it’s claws in to here leg and in the process punctured a vital artery located within. She ended up bleeding to death.

Cite Please, no offense but many Brit papers are no more reliable than the Star or Weekly World News here in America.

I had a cat throw my curling iron into the bathtub once. It wasn’t plugged in, but *she * didn’t know that.

They want to kill us, they just haven’t all figured out how to kill us… yet. :eek:

Cite.

My boss’ mother was recently attacked by one of her long-time pet cat ( a case of re-directed aggression involving another cat outside ). Turned and ripped into her calf. She prevaricated a day or two about going to the hospital and the resultant sepsis came close to killing her. Admittedly she is quite elderly ( 80’s ).

So…possible, just not terribly likely.

  • Tamerlane

I think you mean procrastinated. Or did actually you mean to say she lied about it?

Well, she didn’t fess up to her son for a day or so, either :p.

Otherwise I’m pleading the fifth ;).

  • Tamerlane

When I was working at an animal shelter, I was the only employee who hadn’t been hospitalized for septicemia… Here is a quote from an AVMA publication… bolding mine.

So, I’m guessing it has happened…

A few years back, a friend who was suffering from AIDS became extremely ill from an infection he got from exposure to his cat’s litter box. Since then, his doctors required him to have someone else take care of the litter box.

He survived this, but just barely. I’d imagine there have been others who did die.

I suppose you might stretch it enough to call that being killed by your cat. Maybe.

Ok, but what if you go to Rat Island to write a book and you bring a few cats with you to take care of the rat problem on the island? Once all the rats are dead and the cats have multiplied to be thousands and you are out of cat food and the island is barren of life due to the cats eating everything else, then I think the cats would eat you.

I feel like I’ve read a short story with that exact plot. Does anyone else remember that?

I was hoping it wasn’t too obscure of a reference. There was another one, in the same book, about a cat that killed several family members then crawled down the throat of the guy who was hired to dispose of the cat and killed him from the inside.

OK, dude, let us in on the secret. What book is this?

I’ve heard prevaricate used in this kind of context a fair bit; I think could even be a valid usage; it can mean equivocation as well as outright lying.

Sorry to say, I don’t remember. I thought it was a collection of short stories by Stephen King, but I did some research and came up with nothing. I’ve emailed my brother who I believe has read the book and I’ll let you know if he comes up with anything.

And this whole thing has helped answer the OP’s question- how? :mad: :confused: