Laboratory studies of the ingredients of seven popular flea and tick control products reveal adverse health effects in all animals tested. The effects of these well-known and aggressively marketed products range from seizures, body tremors, and shortness of breath to thyroid cancer, brain injury, and liver and lung tumors. However, TV commercials with trustworthy-looking vets only show the happy side of these products.
What flea and tick pesticide are you using on your dog and / or cat? If your favorite treatment contains the active ingredient fipronil, imidacloprid, methoprene, permethrin, pyriproxyfen, or the inert ingredient butyldhydroxytoluene, butylhydroxanisole, carbitol, ethanol, or polyvinylpyrrplidone, you should also know the not-so-happy side of these products.
If you think your vet or local pet store would never sell you such a sinister poison, think again.
Advantage (Bayer Corporation), Adams Spot-On Flea & Tick Control (Farnam Pet Products), BioSpot Flea & Tick Control (Farnam Pet Products), Defend EXspot Treatment (Schering-Plow Animal Health), Frontline Top Spot (Merial Limited), Frontline Plus (Merial Limited) and Zodiac FleaTrol Spot On (Wellmark International) – all contain one or more of the above active or inert ingredients.
The toxicology and morbidity findings for these pesticide products were compiled during a decade of laboratory testing by the United States Environmental Protection Agency; Occupational Safety and Health Administration, US Department of Labor; Extension of the Toxicology Network; Journal of Pesticide Reform; Pesticide Action Network North America and other sources, with additional information provided by Material Safety Data Sheets.
Most of the tests were conducted for the benefit of new product manufacturers in order to qualify for EPA registration. Scientists overdose laboratory animals to determine how much of the product will kill 50% of the test population. The information is then extrapolated and assumptions made that can be applied to domestic animals and humans.
Based on laboratory tests, Fipronil (Frontline Top Spot and Frontline Plus) is a neurotoxin and is suspected to be a human carcinogen. Fipronil can cause liver toxicity, thyroid cancer, kidney damage, high cholesterol, incoordination, shortness of breath, miscarriage, and delayed growth of the offspring.
Imidacloprid (Advantage) laboratory tests on mice, dogs and rats show that this insecticide is neurotoxic to laboratory animals, and it also causes a disruption of coordination, shortness of breath, thyroid lesions, reduced birth weight and increased birth defects.
The synthetic broad-spectrum pyrethroid insecticide Permethrin (Adams Spot-on Flea & Tick Control; BioSpot Flea & Tick Control; and Defend EXspot Treatment) shows evidence of being an endocrine disruptor and the cause of lung cancer and liver tumors in laboratory animals .
Methoprene and pyriproxyphene (Zodiac FleaTrol Spot On; and BioSpot Flea & Tick Control) are known as Insect Growth Regulators (IGRs), which restrict flea growth to the juvenile stage where reproduction is not possible. Laboratory tests reveal that methoprene causes liver enlargement and kidney degeneration.
Unfortunately, few people read EPA test results. Fewer still want to hear about the many laboratory test subjects (unwanted cats and dogs) killed during and after studies to determine damage to specific systems and organs. But it only takes a few simple-minded people to make the change. Are you ready to stop this madness? There are effective alternatives, as you know.
Today there are totally natural flea and tick remedies, completely harmless to children, pets and the environment, made from botanical essential oils. Some natural products work quite well, some don’t, and some work much better than toxic ones.
The mode of action, the way these natural remedies kill fleas and ticks, is to disrupt the insect’s ability to function by blocking a substance called octopamine. In nature, certain plants have developed a natural defense against insects. These “octopamine blockers” in plants are extracted as oils and used as active ingredients. Octopamine is to an insect what adrenaline is to a human. When the system crashes, the insect dies quickly. Without tousling without problems. Nobody gets hurt except the bug.
Get started today to stop supporting the ruthless lab testing of innocent animals, the insidious cover-up and rush to market by big business, and the unintentional harm we may be doing to our children, our pets, and our planet.