Is the anti-vaxxer movement growing to include pet owners?
Posted January 26, 2018 7:31 am.
Last Updated January 26, 2018 6:10 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – The anti-vaxxer movement — people who believe that vaccines aren’t worth the risk because they actually cause illness — is growing to include pet owners.
A story in the UK points to a growing number of cat and dog owners who think the preventative measures can cause everything from cancer in cats to autism in dogs.
It’s a claim Dr. Jamie Lawson, the head of the BC SPCA‘s business development unit, takes issue with.
“No, having read the article, there’s a number of statements that can’t be backed up by any medical facts and a lot of it is testimonial and hearsay. Do they (vaccines) cause all these things (ailments) that are mentioned? I highly doubt that, there’s no factual evidence to support that.”
Lawson says there are risks associated with all medical treatments, but that doesn’t mean owners should avoid them.
“When you look at the adverse effects of coming down with a disease, could be Parvovirus, could be Feline Distemper (Virus), could be rabies. The benefits of vaccinating, far outweigh the risk of one of these conditions.”
He admits more people are asking questions about the risk associated with vaccinating their pets.
“Clients have to realize that they are putting their pets at risk if they do not get them vaccinated. Nowadays, our core vaccines we do every three years whereas we used to vaccinate every year. Veterinarians are fine-tuning the use of vaccines as a general improvement on the healthcare of animals, not specifically because of side-effects to vaccines and certainly not because we’re worried about Autism or Thyroid Disease or Arthritis,” says Lawson, who has been practicing veterinary medicine for almost 40 years.
He takes particular issue with a statement that says 22,000 cats develop cancer at the site of vaccination every year in the U.S.
“I don’t know how accurate that is. But we do know that there’s a component in some cat vaccines that can cause a localized cancer. And that cancer can develop in about one in 10,000 vaccinations. So veterinarians, realizing that there is that one-in-10,000 risk, now vaccinate over a site not up around the neck but off to the side on a limb or a shoulder so that if the cancer did develop, it can be surgically removed.”
