A study suggests that sleeping with pets may be harmful to humans, even resulting severe illness or death. I'm going to let this marinate a bit and prolly come back and gripe a bunch more later, but for now, I'll say my two little dogs are very clean little beasts. They are indoor pets and and are not eating vermin in my yard. In fact, they pretty much have never had fleas and they are seen to by the vet at regular intervals. If they were outdoor dogs, I might not, but I pretty much never plan to have a full-time outdoor dog.
At first blush, this looks to me to be on par with the "you can get a mortal brain infection from picking your nose" type stories. You may die from space junk falling on you as you walk to the mailbox. We've all gotta die from something.
I sleep with my dogs and have no intention to stop. If that's lethal, then what a way to go, eh? I'll take my snuggly little parasites any day.
12 comments:
We were thrilled when Bob the new cat started sleeping on the bed.
I'm with you, you gotta die from something and I don't think this is high on the list of possibilities.
I do try to keep everyone off my pillow because I'm mildly allergic, but aside from that, everyone has carte-blanche on the furniture. If having pets on the bed is harmful, what about the couch, the chair, the floor?
Studies like that are done by people who just need to cover themselves in sanitizer, put on a hazmat suit and leave the rest of us alone to actually live.
:-)
Personally, I feel a bigger threat from being exposed to the people of Walmart. They sometimes smell worse than any animal and don't appear to be as healthy as my dogs. I know I'd never sleep in the same bed with 99.99% of those people.
Almost every morning I awake to find my big black cat snuggled up along my back. She makes a nice warmer now that it's colder at night.
I'll pass this along to my cat, but something tells me he'll ignore me. And I rather like the pouncing footwarmer.
I wonder how this squares with earlier studies showing that kids who lived in a house with pets (at least some of which, presumably, slept on said kids' beds) and played in dirt, etc. turned out healthier than those that grew up in over sanitized germ-free households.
For myself, while I might prefer that my cats sleep in their own little cat beds beside my wife and me, good luck convincing said cats of the superiority of their own beds over sleeping atop some nice warm human feet on a cold night.
So having two fuzzy krauts snuggled up night might kill me?
Worth it.
BGM
I'm with you, Phlegm. My pups are always welcome!
Sleeping with pets is harmful to one's health?
Hm, gonna have to kick the husband out to the couch, then. =D
I'm with you, honey! I gotta have my little lumbar support purring away in my bed.
I'm with you, I think it's hooey. Our cats are indoor cats and I feel safe with them sleeping on our bed. Petting one of them while drifting off to sleep is comforting.
Please, don't tell anyone that I'm such a softy when it comes to pets. It might ruin my reputation. ;)
More junk science. 6 months from now, they'll probably say "Oh, pets are actually more healthy for you than we thought!" - Basically, if it sounds sensational enough, the media will print it, no matter what the proof is. I can't see how a properly cared for pet can possibly cause you harm by sleeping with you, unless you get up in the middle of the night and trip over it.
Post a Comment