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Why is Cancer Killing Our
Pets?
Courtesy of 'New Living'
Newspaper
March 2001
VACCINES
Over the past decade or so, many veterinarians
have become increasingly convinced that a number of vaccines are doing more harm
than good for our animal companions. Some remain necessary, even mandated
by law, such as rabies. But not all the annual boosters that have been
traditionally given now appear to be necessary and they may be leading to
several diseases. Among the conditions associated with vaccines are skin
allergies, bladder infections and cancer. The U. S. veterinary community
is currently reviewing most vaccines protocols.
When it is time to revaccinate your animal,
your veterinarian should consider the pet's age, his/her lifestyle (indoor or
outdoor), his/her general state of health, the prevalence of the disease in
question in the geographic area where you live, whether your animal is pregnant,
whether or not you board her/him and other factors. Each case is
individual and should be considered as such.
One of the more no-holds-barred statements
about vaccines is Dr. Richard Pitcairn's warning: "Giving a vaccine to an
animal with cancer is like pouring gasoline on a fire." He also
advises not vaccinating pets who have breast tumors or any other growths or
tumors. His overall recommendations regarding vaccines are these: Try to
get your veterinarian to give single or simple vaccines rather than complex
vaccines. Young animals can tolerate a reduced vaccination schedule, but
vaccinating is not advised before sixteen weeks of age. Annual boosters
should be avoided even though they have been popular. Pitcairn goes so far
as to say avoid "any further vaccinations after the initial series as they
are not necessary." He adds that the latest official medical opinion
is that annual boosters are neither required nor effective, although not all veterinarians
will agree with or even know this fact.
THE PET FOOD INDUSTRY
Perhaps the most shocking and informative book
about the pet food industry is Ann Martin's "Food Pet's Die For",
published in 1997. As Dr. Michael W. Fox, vice president of the Humane
Society of the United States, says, "Ann Martin is to the pet food industry
what Rachel Caron was to the petrochemical-pesticide industry."
Martin spent seven years investigating the commercial pet food industry and what
she uncovered isn't pretty. There are several reasons you really do not
want to feed your dog or cat commercial foods. Perhaps the most compelling
moral reason is that there are rendered, euthanized pets in much of this
food. These pets have been mixed with other materials, including some
condemned for human consumption: "rotten meat from supermarket shelves,
restaurant grease..'4-D' (dead, diseased, dying and disabled) animals and
roadkill."
The Minister of Agriculture of Quebec told
Martin that dead animals are often cooked with viscera, bones, fat and
fur. In both the United States and Quebec, this rendering of pets is not
illegal. Martin points to an article originally published in the San
Francisco Chronicle in which an employee and ex-employee of a rendering plant
admitted that their company rendered approximately 250,000 to 500,000 pounds of
animals, scraps and more, including "somewhere between 10,000 and 30,000
pounds of dogs and cats a day."
That's enough to make most of us sick, isn't
it? Martin, a Canadian writer who lives with several animal companions,
went a bit further in her investigations and discovered that some pets are
euthanized with sodium pentobarbital and then rendered. This poison does
not break down and goes into commercial pet food and feed for cows, pigs and
horses. For the detailed report by the FDA's Center for Veterinary
Medicine on popular commercial pet foods containing pentobarbital, click
here. When you read the report, please know that AD (animal digest) is
animal waste (to be polite)!
Two thirds of the pet food manufactured in the
United States contains added preservatives, according to the Animal Protection
Institute. There are also coloring agents, emulsifiers, lubricants,
flavoring agents, pH control agents, synergists and solvents. "Of the
more than 8,600 recognized food additives today, no toxicity information is
available for 46% of them," the institute says.
EQ (ethoxyquin) is the most common antioxidant
preservative in pet foods. It has been found in some dogs' livers and
tissues months after the animal stopped ingesting it. Ethoxyquin is
manufactured by Monsanto Chemical, the largest manufacturer of bioengineered
foods. EQ is listed as a hazardous chemical by the
Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and is considered a
pesticide by the USDA. It is used in most US dog food, but is banned in
Europe. The FDA's Center for Veterinary Medicine requested that pet food
manufacturers voluntarily reduce the maximum level for ethoxyquin by half to 75
parts per million.
PreciousPets.org is pleased to announce
that none of the products offered contain any of the above ingredients!
Additional Reading:
The
“Dirty Little Secret” the Pet Food Companies NEVER Want you to Find Out About!
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