An exploration of human-animal interaction within South African hospitals: case studies of outdoor cats and their caretakers

Abstract

Stray, lost and abandoned pet cats and unsocialised feral cats enter and occupy public spaces such as hospitals in search of food and shelter and establish colonies that impact the operation and health standards of hospitals. These institutions respond differently to such situations. Some focus on destroying the populations, others accept them, while some work with animal welfare organisations and volunteer cat carers to manage the cats’ populations and welfare. Feral cat colonies at hospitals occasionally attract news media attention but there has been little academic focus on the issue in the South African context. Rather than see the animals simply as a nuisance to humans, this qualitative study used the Actor-Network and structuralism theories to examine cat colonies in South African public and private hospitals from the perspective of human-outdoor cat species interaction. Hospitals that have either appointed or have self-volunteered individuals or organisations cat caretakers on the hospital premises were the focus of the study.