It's normal for cats to live outside

It's astonishing that People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, which claims to advocate for animal rights, continues to promote misconceptions about community cats and rabies, as it did in a June 28 letter, "Shelters should admit all cats."Rabies is often misguidedly used to justify the continued use of catch-and-kill schemes for community cats, also known as feral cats. But the facts tell us that effective rabies control actually represents a public health victory. There has not been a single case of a human contracting rabies from a cat in more than 40 years in the United States. The Centers for Disease Control even says human rabies cases are rare, with only one to three cases reported annually, and with infections coming from dogs, bats and raccoons, but not cats.To say that "cats are not safe outdoors" is another huge fallacy that ignores history. Only with the arrival of kitty litter about 70 years ago did it even become practical for cats to live inside with us in the first place. Until then, they lived outdoors exclusively. The truth is it's just as natural for cats to live outside now as it was in the thousands of years before they were domesticated.For those of us who choose to help community cats, Trap-Neuter-Return is the only humane approach with a proven record of success. TNR ends the cycle of breeding, stabilizes the population, helps cats stay healthy by vaccinating against rabies, and addresses the public's needs.Thousands of cities and counties across the U.S. conduct TNR programs, and Alley Cat Allies has tracked more than 650 of them that have adopted official TNR policies and ordinances. That number continues to grow because of the success of these programs.Suggesting that community cats should be removed from their outdoor homes and into shelters, where nearly 100 percent of them will be killed, is not humane and far short of being ethical.Becky RobinsonBethesda, Md.Robinson is the president and founder of Alley Cat Allies, a nonprofit advocacy organization.