Tokyo Residents Paying to Play with Cats

Cat Bag, a new commercial venture in Tokyo, Japan that charges people approximately $5 to play with cats, is proving to be very successful.
http://www.anc.org/pets/pets_article.cfm? identifier=120701_tokyo

- Animal News Center Webmaster

Wow, they really have population control in hand. I bet we could learn from them about positive ways to keep the populations down.

A recent study conducted by the Wellington Asthma Research Group of New Zealand suggests that both the color and length of a cat's fur are completely unrelated to the amount of allergen the animal produces.
http://www.anc.org/pets/pets_article.cfm? identifier=120801_allergen

- Animal News Center Webmaster

That is correct. The allergen is the cat 'dander,' which is what is produced when the cat licks its fur. There is an enzyme in the cat's saliva which when dry tends to flake off, and that, combined with the flakes of skin that also fall off, that combination of dried saliva and skin debris is called 'dander' and THAT is what is allergenic to some folks.

CG

that's odd, cause i had wayy more problems with long haired cats such as the persian my mother in law used to have than with Dubya (who is, at this moment looking at me like 'Come on mom, its time for our nap!' I am allergic to cats and have asthma, BTW, and my skin test came back +4, if that means anything to ppl here.

Well cat allergies come from DANDER not from FUR. Cats that are the type with long hair that you speak of probably have something in their skin/saliva etc that causes dander that is more of an allergen for you than other cats.

Not necessarily. Cat allergies can be caused by multiple proteins in the saliva, the cat's skin, or the fur itself (or sometimes even dust that is carried in the fur which is masked as a cat allergy).

HTH,

That's what I first thought, but read the link http://www.zenoaq.jp/html_e/aj1.html and it's the same issues we have here in the USA.

I was hoping we could export extra cats (tame adoptable neutered ones) to Japan. But it seems people can't have cats not because of a shortage, but not allowed by landlords, and such.

Dee ///////////////////////////////////// The bleeding boat drifted off and I'm stuck here in the pissing rain with my life flashing before me. Only it isn't flashing, it's crawling. Slowly. Now it's just the bare bones of what I am. A tough guy, a helpless dancer. A romantic, is it me for a moment? a bloody lunatic, I'll even carry your bags, a beggar, a hypocrite, love reign over me. Schizophrenic? I'm Bleeding Quadrophenic. /////////////////////////////////////