January/February 2011 - Dogs Naturally Magazine

your dog is a
political issue
by: Catherine O’Driscoll
I have believed, for many years, that the wellbeing
of our four-legged friends is closely related
to politics. Our governments, it seems
to me, are dragons who eat people and pets
whole. I appreciate that some readers will
think that what I say next has nothing to do
with the dogs – but it has everything to do
with them.
A couple of years ago, the banks messed up
and threatened the collapse of the international
money system. So our governments
borrowed money – from banks – to bail out
the banks. Now the banks are doing very
nicely thank you, and their executives have
kept their outrageous bonuses. But the ordinary
people are facing austerities, job losses
and financial ruin in order to pay back the
money the governments borrowed to give to
the banks. Meanwhile, the banks are strangling
the money supply by refusing to give
loans which keep money in circulation. Putting
money in circulation, as all economists
know, is a good way to end a recession. So is
this deliberate or what?
This affects us and our dogs on a very practical
level. I know people, for example, who
have lost their homes. They have given their
dogs away because there is nowhere for them
to live together. I know people who cannot
afford to feed themselves or their dogs or
heat their homes – when, before the banks
messed up, they could.
Since my own dogs began to die of vaccineinduced
disease, I have been watching and
observing. I watched when, two weeks after
I sent out a press release about a cancer-causing
flea control chemical called Carbaryl, it
was withdrawn from sale in children’s head
lice shampoo. I also observed that the veterinary
licensing body, the Veterinary Medicines
Directorate (VMD) had a meeting with
flea control product manufacturers and gave
them 18 months to use their stocks up on
dogs. Carbaryl, incidentally, is more carcinogenic
to dogs than to any other species.
I observed that when Canine Health Concern
attended a meeting at the VMD to discuss
the traceability of veterinary medicines,
we were the only animal welfare organisation
in attendance. I also observed that pharmaceutical
industry representatives blocked our
inexpensive software solution which would
enable veterinarians and government licensing
bodies to easily trace adverse reactions to
veterinary drugs and vaccines, and the VMD
let them block positive change.
When Canine Health Concern conducted
research into adverse reactions occurring
post-vaccination in dogs, the VMD asked
to scrutinise our research. We said yes, willingly
– but we stipulated that an individual
without pharmaceutical industry ties should
do the scrutinising. The VMD put up a professor
with pharmaceutical industry ties. We
asked them to appoint an independent. They
said no.
The VMD then launched a working party to
look into canine and feline vaccines in the
UK. Guess what. This so-called independent
working group was comprised of individuals
who took consultancy money and
grants from the pharmaceutical industry.
And guess what they recommended? They
said we should carry on vaccinating our dogs
and cats every year. This is despite the fact
that, since the 1970s, it has been known that
dogs and cats remain immune to viral disease
for years or life.
I’ve seen, over and over again, that if concerned
dog lovers write to their political
representatives to have annual vaccination
stopped, or to have redundant one-year vaccines
withdrawn from the market, they simply
get the brush-off from the licensing body
– the VMD – and our politicians do nothing.
Jonathan Powell was chief of staff to Tony
Blair, a recent British prime minister. In his
book, The New Machiavelli, he revealed that
the power of the British prime minister is “illusory
… like the crock of gold at the end of
the rainbow”. Civil service mandarins and
newspaper proprietors seem to be wielding
real power, he said.
The head of the VMD has written to us to
say that he does not have the power to withdraw
redundant one-year vaccines from the
market, and we must write to the secretary of
state. But the secretary of state takes her advice
from the VMD. We know this because if
we write to our political representatives, they
write to the secretary of state, and she consults
the VMD. Then we get a non-answer,
and intransigence, back from the VMD.
It hasn’t gone beyond my notice that the
head of the VMD speaks at pharmaceutical
industry events and appears overly chummy
with the industry he’s been appointed to
oversee. I’ve also observed that VMD staff
receive money by way of research grants and
consultancy fees from the very industry they
are supposed to be regulating. But if anyone
complains, they just get told that VMD staff
are people of the highest integrity.
In which case, why are one-year vaccines still
on the market? They simply facilitate overvaccination,
and leave our animals open to
vaccine-induced disease. They have no practical
use or benefit. Their existence facilitates
fraud. The VMD, incidentally, relies upon
the pharmaceutical industry for the large
part of its income.
40 January-February 2011 | Dogs Naturally Magazine