Could They ALL Have a Cold?

All 5 of my cats have stuffy noses and sneezing fits! Charlotte started it 2 weeks ago, then seemed to get over it. A week later, Jack started in; it seems as if he's almost over it now. A few days ago Charlotte started the sneezing again, and within the past 2 days Katie, Bridget, and Rufus have all started having the sneezing fits, too. Their little noses are stuffy, and they're breathing thru their mouths occasionally. They seem to be sleeping a little more than usual; they all ate their breakfast a little while ago, and still come for treats thru-out the day.

I called the vet's office yesterday and spoke with the head tech; she said as long as there wasn't any green mucus coming from their noses and their eyes weren't runny that I shouldn't worry about it. I asked about giving them all a course of anti-biotics and she said she didn't think that was necessary. (of course, this was without her actually seeing one of them)

We've been a multi-cat household for over 30 years, and this is the first time everyone has had something like this at the same time. I just got over a 5 week long respiratory problem; could I have passed it on to them? If it's just a cold, like the tech seems to think, will they just keep passing it back and forth? Is there anything I can do to make them feel better? I know how miserable I feel when I have a cold, and I hate seeing my babies feeling puny.

Years ago I had two cats... One caught a cold, then the other caught it off him. The vet said it was nothing to worry about, so I just snuggled extra with them and made them feel loved... They got over it pretty quickly =]
Mind you, this is years ago, and it hasn't happened since..

Antibiotics won't likely help if it's a cold, unless they get a secondary bacterial infection as well. You can ask the vet/vet tech about giving them L-lysine and at what dose. If the cold is a feline herpes infection, lysine can help stop the replication of the virus and allow them to recover more quickly. You can get lysine pills at any drug store--just make sure the ingredients don't include propylene glycol, which is a preservative that can be harmful to cats.

http://pethealth.petwellbeing.com/wi...Conjunctivitis

After worrying about it some more, I called the vet's office this morning to see if I could get at least one cat in today. Turned out one of the vets is out sick, as are 2 techs, and they are booked solid until Monday! Of course, I could drop one of the cats off early and maybe they could look her over between appointments, but they couldn't guarantee it. Well, that's obviously no good. So, I decided I was just worrying too much and I'd call a different vet if I thought anyone was getting worse.
About that time, I happened to notice that Jack was visiting the litter box---a lot. After watching him make numerous trips over the course of half an hour, I got in the car and went to the vet's office and told them I needed some antibiotics to at least get everyone thru the weekend. They were very agreeable, and sent me home with enough to dose all 5 until they could see Bridget (and maybe Jack) on Monday. They usually let me keep a couple of boxes of amoxy drops on hand, but I had run out and forgotten to replace them. They know it's almost impossible for me to get one of the kids there by myself (bad back) and DH works ridiculous hours and isn't always available to help.
At least now I feel as if I'm doing something for them (besides making them all p.o.'d at me); hopefully, things will settle down a bit until we can get one or two of them looked at Monday.