11 Comments
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Eric Fish, DVM's avatar

Thank you for writing about this! I had no idea about the trend of fake vets selling supplements online, one of the (few) downsides of being largely off social media and never joining TikTok is being out of step with the cultural zeitgeist. There is a special place in Hell for people who manipulate scared pet owners with made-up sob stories about euthanizing pets to sell them crap 🤬 I will share this widely to raise awareness!

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KB's  FROM THE PETRI DISH's avatar

The "wellness" industrial complex has reached into the pet care business. What worrisome to me is the idea of NOT vaccinating your pet, including Rabies!

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Eric Fish, DVM's avatar

Rabies vaccination is legally required for cats and dogs, so compliance with that one is about as high as you can get in society. But there is a growing trend of people declining other important vaccines, like DA2PP that protects against parvo, distemper, and other horrible viruses

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KB's  FROM THE PETRI DISH's avatar

Yes, it is necessary for pet licenses in most states but there are the exceptions, sadly https://time.com/5538926/dogs-vaccines-antivaxxers/.

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Amalia's avatar

So helpful! Thank you!! 🤗

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dlnevins's avatar

Thank you for alerting your readers to this scam practice!

I bet there are fake physicians selling supplements to desperate humans as well, using the same tricks.

It makes me question what the point of licensure is, if the people behind these scams are never going to be held accountable for what they are doing. Right now it looks like they can rake in all the bucks, with none of the liability that a REAL professional assumes.

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Eric Fish, DVM's avatar

There probably are, but there are much stricter rules governing scope of practice and advertising in human medicine (at least in the US), so my guess is it’s at least somewhat less prevalent. If you made a hard claim on treating a medical condition it is subject to FDA regulation and action, though there are big exceptions around supplements that a lot exploit.

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Speaking for Spot's avatar

And, it very much does a disservice to our profession.

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Speaking for Spot's avatar

Oh wow. I had no idea about this. Tells you how much time I spend online scrolling.

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Barbara Faigen's avatar

This is sickening. How many pet parents have been taken in by these claims?

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Phil Toro's avatar

Thank you for taking the time to write about this, I had no idea that this was going on. 🙏

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