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Americans stuff pets with drugs
09/03/2007 13:52 - (SA)
Wayne County - With aging, it's become a routine faithfully endured by the Guffords.
Each day starts with a blood sugar check and a shot of insulin. Then a couple of pills, maybe mashed into a bowl of tuna and canned carrots. Mixed with dry chow.
All for their 12-year-old dog.
Brownie takes more drugs than his human companions put together.
He has been medicated in recent months for diabetes, infections, high blood pressure, and his finicky gut that rebels at red meat.
Since 2005, he has taken drugs for everything from anemia to a spider bite.
"He's our baby, he's a family member, I would want somebody to do that for me," explains Ann Gufford.
She estimates spending $5 000 over the last two years on medicine for her baby, a mixed beagle-cocker spaniel.
He has lost a couple of steps on the squirrels outside their little home near Goldsboro. His hearing is failing. Still, without some of the drugs, he'd probably be gone.
"You cannot put a price on that," says Mrs Gufford.
"And I don't want to," adds her husband, Ben.
Americans have begun to medicate their dogs, cats and sometimes other pets much as they medicate themselves.
They routinely treat their pets for arthritis, cancer, heart disease, diabetes, allergies, dementia, and soon maybe even obesity.
They pick from an expanding menu of mostly human pharmaceuticals like steroids for inflammation, antibiotics for infection, anti-clotting agents for heart ailments, Prozac or Valium for anxiety, even the impotence drug Viagra for a lung condition in dogs.
Americans bought $2.9bn worth of pet drugs in 2005
Increasingly, they buy at people pharmacies or online and sometimes pay with health insurance.
Until recent decades, American veterinarians still concentrated on care that reflected the country's agrarian roots: keeping farm animals healthy to protect the human food supply.
Instead of being medicated, a very sick animal was quickly sacrificed to save the herd.
Pets were typically kept outside with the cows, chickens and pigs. A dog was lucky for a dry place in a crude shelter; a cat, for a warm spot in the barn.
Within the last five years, pets have finally overtaken farm animals in the pharmaceutical marketplace, claiming 54% of spending for animal drugs, according to the trade group Animal Health Institute.
Keeping more than 130 million dogs and cats alone, Americans bought $2.9bn worth of pet drugs in 2005.
Though equal to only 1% of human drug sales, the market has grown by roughly half since the year 2000.
Intensifying bond between pets and their people
"As more and more drugs are being developed for people, more and more drugs are being developed for veterinary medicine. It's really a parallel track," says Dr. Gerald Post, founder of the non-profit Animal Cancer Foundation.
The US Food and Drug Administration has approved more than 40 new pet drugs over the past five years.
The market growth reflects an intensifying bond between pets and their people, who are comforted by the unquestioning love of their animals in an affluent society where traditional institutions are frayed and mobility severs family ties.
A 2002 survey for the American Veterinary Medical Association found that 47% of people viewed their pets as family members.
This attitude - people depending on their pets - makes customers vulnerable to overspending, some vets warn.
- AP
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South Africa
