Progressive Wednesday

Drug rehab for Asian vultures

This comes out of Washington State University College of Veterinary Medicine:

In an effort to save its dwindling Asian vulture populations, India has announced it will ban veterinary use of the drug diclofenac.

Lindsay Oaks of the Washington State University College of Veterinary Medicine and The Peregrine Fund discovered that the drug used as an anti-inflammatory in cattle was highly toxic to the vultures when they ate carcasses of treated animals.

The drug causes renal failure in the birds, which kills them rather quickly. More than 95% of these animals are now gone from India, Pakistan, and Nepal, forcing the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources to put the bird on their critically endangered list.

Feral dogs, now thriving because of the die-off of their rival, are now adding to the 30,000 human deaths in India caused by rabies each year. This is the largest number in the world, with more than two-thirds of infections coming from dog bites. India has made rabies vaccines much more available recently, but that increase hasn't kept up with the increase in dog bites. Why? The feral dog population has gone up by seven million since the pandemic started.

But the news isn't all bad. As we told you, last May, India ordered that diclofenac be replaced by similar alternative drugs that do not poison vultures such as meloxicam. Nepal and Pakistan followed suit shortly thereafter, banning both the manufacturing and importation of the drug. Breeding programs have also recently been successful in hatching Asian vulture chicks, with hopes that in a few years the chicks will be able to survive on their own. And in Punjab Province, they are already seeing the number of vultures start to rebound.

There are several organizations involved in the repopulation effort. The Peregrine Fund and VulturesDecline.org are two of the leaders. If you want to help out, click here .

Oh, and in case you were wondering, diclofenac is still a widely-used drug in both human and veterinary medicine, and is even sold over-the-counter in the United States. Many vets have discontinued use, but the next time Fido strains a ligament, make sure diclofenac ain't what the doctor ordered.

A tip of the cap to Gov. Ted Kulongoski

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