In an insanitary house inhabited by an elderly couple, around thirty dead cats were found in a freezer. According to those in charge of the abuse investigations at the Besançon Spa, the husband would suffer from Noah syndrome.
It is a very sad affair for the defenders of the animal cause, but it sheds light on pathologies of the human being which can be known, even unknown to the greatest number. The corpses of frozen cats, thirty in all, and about forty others alive, but in a deplorable state of health, were found in the house, littered with "animal and human excrement", of an elderly couple in Besançon.
"In the freezers, more than thirty dead cats were found," said Juliette Dupoux, departmental security commissioner of Besançon, can we read in La Dépêche.
According to the SPA, on the bags containing the corpses were indicated the names of the frozen cats.
Some of the surviving cats are affected by mange, because they lived "in catastrophic hygienic conditions, like unfortunately the man and his wife," said Sandra Majstorovic, head of abuse investigations at the Spa in Besançon. Others are malnourished and dehydrated. According to the local press, the SPA announced that it would file a complaint for "mistreatment".
When questioned by the police, the 77-year-old husband explained that "because he did not know what to do with the dead cats, he froze them". For Sandra Majstorovic, "this gentleman has Noah's syndrome".
Noah's syndrome
This Noah syndrome is a limitless need to adopt more and more pets, most often to the detriment of their health.
The places of residence thus become refuges, but the owners are incapable of assuming and protecting them.
A bit of history now. In Genesis, the famous Noah (yes, everything is linked) had to build an ark to shelter before the flood pairs of animals of each race, to preserve life. Psychiatry has therefore used the name of the biblical character to name the mental illness which pushes to gather more and more animals, even without money or without place: the "syndrome of Noah" (in English, "animal hoarding" – "accumulation of 'animals"). Thanks to Psychology magazine for the explanation.
In the 1980s, Gary Patronek, veterinarian and epidemiologist, then headed a local branch of the SPCA (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) which brought to light this mental disorder. And in 1997, the specialist founded an interdisciplinary group, the Hoarding of Animal Research Consortium (HARC) in Massachusetts, to study this phenomenon and raise awareness among mental health and social service professionals. In a first study in 1999, it was mentioned that "76% of affected individuals were female, lived alone and 46% were aged 60 or over".
Data confirmed by a Brazilian study dating from 2017 (Ferreira et al). Year after year, reports of this pathology have multiplied. It is therefore referenced in the DSM-V, the Bible for psychiatrists.
Where does this trouble come from?
Pauline Desormiere, veterinarian, gives in her thesis "Contribution to the study ofanimal hoarding in veterinary medicine " some answers :
"We first define the place of the companion animal in our society, and the link that has always existed between humans and animals. These relationships, mainly beneficial, are not always so, and dysfunctional relationships, still little described, exist. The animal hoarding is an example. An animal hoarder, often stereotyped as 'an old mad cat' is defined as a person who has obsessively accumulated a large number of animals and finds himself unable to provide them with the minimum of care (medical, health, nutritional …) and to meet their specific needs; who is unable to recognize the deterioration of the condition of animals and the environment as well as the negative effect on his own health, his well-being, and that of his family ".
Animal protection associations are trying to monitor the owners affected by visits. Legal intervention by the authorities is necessary to remove the animals from their ordeal. People with Noah's syndrome should be followed by psychologists and / or psychiatrist, because if this disease is not treated, the person may begin to endanger their health and that of the animals.