Can GPs catch a sickness from us?

[cielo]

Everybody in my house is currently sick. My mother is telling me to not touch any of our pets, until I fell better, because they can catch it. I do not think is possible, but I am washing my hands before I touch the cages, and clean and feed as fast as I can. I'm wondering if is possible that they get some of our sicknesses. I feel bad for them, but anyway I do not want to sneeze, and cough on top of them anyway...

[piggieluver101]

It's going around here too. I don't know if they can. They might because they are little and more frail than us but, I don't know for sure.

[AmysAnimals]

Im not sure about guinea pigs but I know hamsters can catch colds from humans. Since they are somewhat similiar maybe piggies can too. This is certainly a question for the experts and I would love to know the answer also.

[piggieluver101]

Hamsters and Amy.

[AmysAnimals]

Ok, I did a quick google search and here is what I found, I hope it helps you out.

Ruttling
Whenever you handle your pig you should lift him up and put the side of his chest to your ear. If his breathing has a ruttle he will need a course of antibiotics, by ignoring this it could lead to a more serious illness. You can help him feel a bit better by putting a dab of Vick on the end of his nose, this will help clear the congestion, but this is not instead of antibiotics this is as well as. Remember pigs can catch colds off of humans so if you have a cold either get someone else to feed and clean out for a while or wear a mask.

[piggieluver101]

Ok, so they CAN catch our colds. Good, at least now we know.

[Pennsylvania Pigger]

Amy, you might want to mention where you found that information so nobody accuses you of plagiarizing.

Aside from hamsters and colds, I was under the impression that most illnesses are species-specific.

[AmysAnimals]

I wanted to mention the site, but it had a side link about breeding. If I would have posted the link, I would have gotten pelted with stones and it would have been removed anyway so I figured why bother. Im pretty sure no one will accuse me of plagiarizing since I mentioned it was not my own original work. I, personally, would have been happy to give the site credit but I know that it would only cause more problems and accusations of not reading the rules. This happened to me concerning another post. Ill do another search and see if I can find more information on the guinea pig/cold issue.

[AmysAnimals]

Here are a couple sites I find that you can read if you want to:

http://www.chucklebunnies.net/blog/?p=7

http://www.dagfinnur.is/?c=webpage&id=122 (side bars are in a different language, I have no clue why)

http://www.cavymadness.com/carehealth.html (Under section "The Respiratory System")

Hopefully all these links will help out and follow the rules properly. I hope this helps

[Pennsylvania Pigger]

Was just trying to help. I've seen other people on the forum firmly corrected for posting quotes without a source.

Thanks for doing the research.