A nursing home in America got a six-month-old kitten named Oscar as a therapy cat but soon discovered the strange cat had some powers – it could detect a dying person and the next patient to die.
Oscar was one of six cats adopted by Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Providence, Rhode Island, United States in 2005 and was said to prefer being alone. However, he would sometimes choose to be with one of the nursing residents and that person would pass away within a few hours.
According to reports, the cat’s behavior was taken seriously after the pet accurately predicted the next person to die by lying close to the person. It was said that he would skip an obviously dying person for a healthy one, and that person would end up dying first.
At a point, the staff took it upon themselves to contact family members if they noticed the cat with someone.
It was suspected that Oscar could sense the lack of movement in such patients or that he could detect the smell released by the dying cells of a person nearing death.
Oscar made international headlines in 2007 after the New England Journal of Medicine published an article about him by Steere House geriatrician Dr. David Dosa.
Oscar the cat died in 2022 and was said to have correctly predicted 100 deaths.
