the injection-site sarcoma issue has largely been eliminated by the removal of the adjuvent, the change in placement of the vaccine, and the advent of safer inoculations, and non-injecting manners of delivery.
if you're NEVER going to bring another cat into your house, EVER, then i'd say, don't vaccinate. but if you are, i'd do the full initial series--which, personally, i think is effective for life, too, tho research hasn't been done to confim this. even with that research, that's how vaccines SHOULD work in all species, plus there's lots of anecdotal evidence of negatives living with positives for years without getting regular vaccinations never getting sick. remember, again, that cats who test negative CAN, indeed, retest positive later on--doesn't mean they were negative at all, just that they were tested before the viral exposure was registering on the test. there are no cases of TRULY positive cats (tested twice, with the second test long enough after the first to remove the possibility of a reaction to exposure.) it's horrible when it happens, but it happens very infrequently. there is absolutely no research that i've seen that says that vaccinating a positive stresses its immune system out, because until the virus is activated, FeLVs are not frail, compromised creatures walking around with smelling salts and hankies. in fact, there is anecdotal evidence from members of this list that vaccinating positives STRENGTHENS their immune response, as evidenced by their seeming to have much longer life spans than positives who are not vaccinated.... we just have to convince some researchers to follow up on that, and good luck with that. MC -- Spay & Neuter Your Neighbors! Maybe That'll Make The Difference.... MaryChristine Special-Needs Coordinator, Purebred Cat Breed Rescue (www.purebredcats.org) Member, SCAT (Special-Cat Action Team) _______________________________________________ Felvtalk mailing list Felvtalk@felineleukemia.org http://felineleukemia.org/mailman/listinfo/felvtalk_felineleukemia.org
