"If I could only reach that one spot!" Photo: doug88888/Flickr
Spot-on flea and tick treatments are liquid pesticides typically applied to the skin between the animal's shoulder blades or along the back. Some of those products, like Advantage, are sold only through licensed vets. Others, like Frontline and Hartz, are available in retail stores. But don't let that difference fool you. Spot-ons from vets and from pet shops can contain the same chemicals, and they're subject to exactly the same regulations by the EPA. "EPA is looking at all the spot-on products, regardless of formulation, regardless of manufacturer," said Kemery.
Spokespersons for both Bayer Animal Health (which makes Advantage and Advantix products) and Hartz said they haven't seen a rise in adverse effects from their products. They and other manufacturers of spot-on products are working closely with the EPA to get to the bottom of the story, Bob Walker, spokesman for Bayer Animal Health, told us.
The news of the EPA analysis has left many pet owners feeling confused and frightened. But is the problem as scary as it sounds? Steven Hansen, senior vice president of the Animal Health Services at the ASPCA, told us he's skeptical that adverse reactions to spot-on products have increased so dramatically. He points out that the spike in reported problems came just after the widely publicized pet-food recall of 2007. "The pet-food recall raised awareness for reporting issues with animals to a level we haven't ever been anywhere near," he said. "I really wonder if there's not just a much greater awareness and a greater reporting."
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MY MOTHER USED ADVANTAGE ON HER 5 YR. OLD CAT AND WITH IN 30 MIN OF PUTTING THIS ON HER SHE COULD NOT BREATH STARTED TO CONVULSE AND DIED ON THE WAY TO THE VETS AUTOPSY SAID SEVEAR ALERGIC REACTION TO FLEA MED... I'LL NEVER USE THEM ON MY PETS
Yes, adverse reactions can happen. The pity of it is that so many owners follow the advice of their vets or the pharma companies like sheep..all these folks make $$ from treatments regardless of whether the animal needs the treatment or not. I say if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
I have a license as a vet tech in NY State so I know a little about these things. Vaccine schedules were made longer when it became widely known (and accepted by the AVMA, which is like the AMA) that they conferred longer immunity than previously thought. Also, owners started suing over vaccine-induced sarcomas
(VAS). And owners don't request antibody titer tests, showing if a previous vaccinationis still effective,because these tests would much more expensive than the vaccines themselves.
My wife and I only started giving our 2 dogs and 2 cats spot-on flea meds after we temporarily moved to her late parents' apartment after ours was burnt in a fire in June 2005. We had a flea infestation and took action. We continued the meds after we moved back to our own apartment. In 2006 our female Australian
cattle dog was diagnosed with always fatal bladder cancer. What is this leading to, you ask. Well, one day while working in a vet practice, I looked up bladder cancer in a thick tome about diseases and conditions used by the all the vets as a resource. Guess what I found? It said that bladder cancer was associated with flea prevention products.
Heartworm pills need only be given evrery 2 months, and not every month, to be effective because of the life cycle of the heartworm and how the medicine affects the various juvenile and adult stages.
How many people do you know whose animals had heartworm?
Caveat: it's dangerous to treat and may be fatal if the anmal has
heartworms.
Likewise, after observing the slow, terrible death of a dog from leptospirosis despite thousands of $$ of treatment, from that moment on I started vaccinating my dogs for lepto, even though it may not be that common a disease.
It's a science and a judgment call.
Sorry about your mom's young cat. I wish you and your animals a long, happy and healthy life.
I just finished researching this topic and have a blog dedicated to flea control options.
It might be that the previous incidents have gone unreported but that type of increase is serious cause for concern.
When it comes to flea control there are less toxic options that are not dependent on the pharmaceutical industry.
Toxicity issues from these products not only impact the pets but also the children and other family members within the household.
If you wish to follow my tracking this topic please feel free to follow me on twitter or on my blog:
URLs are:
http://twitter.com/FleaControlBook
http://www.fleacontrolsecrets.com/fleatreatment/
To Ark Lady:
I don't know of any reliable and foolproof ways to prevent or eradicate fleas besides the ones the pharma companies developed.
I could be wrong. Also, the best ways to prevent them is by periodic vacuuming of the environment, boiling sheets etc.
I don't understand why in the article it says Merck is developing an alternative to spot on flea products, there IS already a monthly pill, it's called Comfortis.
I had tried Zodiak flea prevention on a cat I rescued and she appeared to go into a seizure. I quickly wiped the stuff off of the back of her neck. After a while she was fine. Swore off of that stuff after seeing that. And has anybody asked if the increase in pet cancers could be a result of the flea remedies used today? I wonder.
I found a natural way to remove fleas, that save the kittie that I rescued,he was full of fleas and the vet say to me that was very risky to put any medication on him, so I went to natural remedies search, and I found this: Just mix few drops of lavender essential oil with baby shampoo let work for about 5 minutes then rinse.You will see the fleas all dead and your pet will smell so nice , also clean using any cleaner with lavender scent, that will keep the fleas away for sure. Good luck.
We live in a very rural area. Ticks are more of an issue than fleas. frontline does the job keeping the deer ticks away from my family.
I have Lymes. I do have a small siamese who recently had a seizure.
We love our pets . So if there is a better way. Let me know.Please..