The significance of cats, Felis silvestris catus L., 1758, in the rabies epidemic process on the territory of Russia

The purpose of the study is to assess the importance of cats in the epizootic and epidemic process of rabies in the territory of the Russian Federation in the spatio-temporal aspect from the middle of the 20th century to the present. The incidence of rabies in cats in Russia and their importance in maintaining the epidemic process of rabies from 1956 to the present have been studied. Domestic and neglected (homeless cats,), along with dogs, support anthropurgic foci of rabies. There has been an exponential increase in feline rabies. In the last 20 years, there has been a tendency to increase the proportion of domestic animals in the overall structure of the incidence of rabies in animals. In 2022, the share of cats was 20.4 %. Among domestic carnivores (cats and dogs), the proportion of cats was 41.4 %. During 2022, the maximum number of sick cats was registered in January (17.8 %), for the summer and spring months med = 8.4 %. By infecting people with rabies, the domestic cat is in third place after the dog and the fox. Most of the sick people who became infected from cats were rural residents. Among them, 2/3 were women. Among those with rabies, they did not remember the fact of an animal attack in 28.2 ± 6.4 % of cases. The proportion of victims bitten by orphan cats and dogs in the total structure of victims of dogs and cats of all categories increased from 33.8 ± 0.3 % in 1991 to 53.0 ± 0.3 % in 2004. There was a prevalence of bites by stray cats on children and young people under 20 years of age (33.3 ± 6.7 % versus 13.4 ± 4.6 % of other age categories of all deaths). As the age of affected individuals increased, the mean incubation period increased to 93.2 days in women and 108.5 days in men. The shortest IP was observed in wounds of the face, and a longer IP was observed in wounds of the extremities.