Giving all the available components of the dog vaccine each year? Now that is in my view another story altogether …
I had a lady in my consulting room the other day who was quite evangelical about dog vaccinations, or more precisely how bad they were, what damage they did and why they should not be given. Her source of information was predictably a dog breeder, who had gleaned these “ facts “ from a dog magazine. I have been aware for some time that there is a movement against dog vaccination in this country [ uk ], a bit like the controversy over the MMR vaccine in humans. On this occasion I was quite proud of my restraint and listened politely to what she had to say and did not slip into my Father Jack Hackett of Craggy Island mode! As I listened to her my mind slipped back to my student days when I saw practice in a small clinic close to a sprawling Glasgow housing estate in the late 1970s. The people who lived on the estate were by and large decent nice people but in those days there was very little spare cash and the result was that dogs and cats were rarely vaccinated. The norm there was that at most morning and evening consulting sessions we saw young animals with diseases such as distemper and cat flu and lots of them died despite treatment. When parvo virus hit the canine population in the early 1980s the scenes I saw at the same Glasgow clinic were horrific, there were dogs on drips in every available space, they all had dysentery and again lots of them died. Now the question you have to ask yourself is, nowadays why do I not see any of these diseases at my clinic in my town? The answer of course is simply because a large percentage of the population down here have their animals vaccinated. To stop dog and cat vaccines would be folly, it would set the clock back to the situation I have described above. In Finland recently there was a distemper outbreak in which around 5000 dogs suffered needlessly. Closer to home we had a breeder on our books whose dogs suffered a parvovirus outbreak after he had switched from conventional vaccination to an alternative method.
Overvaccination? Giving all the available components of the dog vaccine each year? Now that is in my view another story altogether. While I have never seen any convincing evidence that it will cause any damage I think that for the best of motives us vets have in the past given far too much vaccine.
Take my own case for example, when I was a child I was vaccinated against polio and other childhood diseases, when I was at secondary school I had the BCG vaccine and also shots against tetanus. When I was in my twenties I traveled a lot and so had vaccinations against various tropical diseases, and when I was in my thirties I was a quarantine vet and had rabies vaccinations as well. Now do I saunter down to the local doctor each year and have all of those jabbed in me each year, of course I do not because the immunity from the human vaccines lasts a very long time, and I have come to understand that dogs are no different.
I have been so concerned over the vaccination issue that I have recently changed my clinic’s dog vaccination policy. We now only give the main booster vaccine each third year, this consists of protection against distemper, hepatitis, parvo virus, parainfluenza, and leptospirosis. Giving this injection each third year is equivalent to a human having a vaccination every twenty one years. In the two intervening years we will be giving parainflenza and leptospirosis protection alone as it has been proved that the immunity conferred by the currently available vaccines for these conditions can be very short lived.
To recap we will still be seeing dogs each year for a booster vaccination of some sort but we will be ensuring that your animal is not excessively vaccinated. We always treat a vaccination consultation as a chance to check the animal over thoroughly and an opportunity to discuss with the owner any concerns that they might have.
Scott Nimmo
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I have just watched a video called “In search of the truth about dogs” an introduction to natural canine health. Its contents cover the subject on why it is harmful and unnecessary to vaccinate every year. Other subjects include the best way to feed dogs and keep them healthy. The video is very interesting but now I am worrying what to do about vaccinations, who can really be trusted to give the best advice. I just want to do what is best for my dog’s, it is not a case of trying to save money. Any unbiased advice would be welcome.
Hello Sheila,
Thanks for dropping by, I can give you unbiased advice because although I do work with dogs I do not personally now earn a penny from any vaccinations or treatment, so I have no axe to grind ….
While of course I do not include you in this category there are many people around who suggest that vaccines per se are in some way harmful, of course there is the odd reaction with all vaccinations whether vaccines human or animal but overall there are much greater benefits.
Consider smallpox vaccination for example, this was a serious human disease which affected the human population world wide and caused much misery and death to millions of people but now it has been virtually eliminated from the face of the earth. I am sure in the early days of Jenner and the first vaccination trials there were many side effects but no one can argue that the world is not better off as a result.
As I said in my article when I was a young vet in the 1970′s I saw practice in a poor urban area of Glasgow and I saw many cases of dogs with distemper, cats with cat flu and then parvo came along. These were in the main pitiful heart rending cases, the population who lived there in those days could often not afford to vaccinate their animals, or sometimes pay for the treatment.
I then moved to near London to an affluent area and set up practice and as we moved through the 1990′s I almost never saw these diseases as almost everyone vaccinated their animals in my area.
Last year I sold my practice and moved to the Philippines permanently and now carry out charity work with dogs, I am now seeing loads of animals dying needlessly again because people generally do not vaccinate and there is not much I can do about it.
Further I have given countless thousands of vaccinations in my life and have seen adverse effects in only a very few cases, almost all, say more than 99.9% did not show any reaction whatsoever except perhaps a short lived transient lethargy, again in just a few cases. So when you think things through and look at the history of medicine most people will agree that vaccines are a great benefit.
But I do agree that it is likely that veterinary surgeons do over vaccinate, the distemper vaccination for example may give five or six years protection but vets may give it every year.This is most likely just a waste of resources and there have been no properly conducted scientific studies done which show that this is harmful. The theories to the contrary are purely anecdotal and are usually spread by well meaning but scientifically uneducated lay people.
Hopefully though in time veterinary surgeons and vaccine manufacturers will join forces and conduct studies to find out what is the minimum vaccination regimes to still give effective protection but to be very blunt commercial forces are at work here …. I guess that’s life.
My advice to you is to keep your vaccinations up to date and trust your vet because if vaccination is reduced on any scale we will set the clock back in developed countries to the position I am now experiencing here in here in the Philippines. Parvo and other preventable diseases are very common indeed, few people have the resources for dog vaccines or indeed proper treatment so dogs suffer and die on a large scale with no one to help them, anything I do is is just a tiny drop in a giant ocean …
Well off my soap box now
Regards,
Scott
“a bit like the controversy over the MMR vaccine in humans.”
Indeed, which is getting alot of attention right now over falsified data.
http://scienceblogs.com/authority/2009/02/scientific_misconduct_and_the.php
Being involved in dog rescue I have also seen the end result of no vaccination; I do not wish that experience on anyone.
u guys r crazy who would get bit by a cat or dog
Hi Shelby,
Well I guess if you have chosen to earn your living with dogs and cats then the odd bite will be an occupational hazard.
Stings a bit though
Regards,
Scott