ISOLATING NEW KITTENS
Every time I get new kittens at TPR, I follow a strict 10-day isolation protocol. I don't have to isolate babies from my own pets, who are all fully vaccinated and healthy, but if there are other kittens already with me, they can't come in any kind of contact, however remote, for 10 full days. Even a seemingly healthy, perfect kitten can succumb and die on day 9 or 10--I've seen it happen more than once.
The 10 day isolation allows for any diseases to manifest. Any cross contamination at all can infect the others with whatever the new guys may have carried in. That means separate sets of feeding equipment and food, separate meds, separate bedding, separate nest boxes in different parts of the house (for nursing babies) or rooms (for independent ones), separate litter boxes, and obsessive hand-washing. This is in addition, of course, to isolation of kittens from anything that might be coming in from outdoors--namely germs that are on our hands and clothes after we pet cats outside (especially in Israel, where we have millions of street cats to cuddle).
Everything that touches new kittens gets washed in hot water and bleach, and there will be LOTS of laundry to do. Bottles get sterilized before going back in the cupboard. Liquid meds are not drawn straight from the bottle if they are ever to be shared with others, unless you draw with a sterile syringe every time (which no one does). There needs to be a routine, almost obsessive attention to disease control, or you can lose many, many cats if a pathogen escapes.
Last year (2016), there must have been a single carrier of something massively lethal to kittens (impossible to know what) who passed through the city shelter where I get all my rescues. Sanitation and disease control in the cat room there are abysmal, and this bug travelled through 3 full months of my kittens. I only had one survivor all summer...and she was a miracle save. So, while I was isolating and following protocol, the shelter where they had been kept before they got to me, sometimes for only a matter of hours, wasn't. It was the most disastrous, hellish, depressing summer of my life.
The most lethal pathogens travel expertly by air, water, feces, and any other feasible method. Some of them can survive in the environment for months before finding new hosts. A kitten who gets something like panleuk has essentially no chance...so don't let disease spread.
Isolate perfectly and with great attention, for 10 full days. Use tons of hot water and bleach on floors, bedding, litter boxes, cages (but nothing that touches food!) Open windows to keep the air clean and moving. Get some sun (it kills many germs). ISOLATE!!
