by Dr. Kim Bloomer
Recently a news article was brought to my attention entitled 8 Pets That Pose Major Health Threats to Kids – which is why I named this article in response to this most preposterous nonsense put forth by none other than the Academy of American Pediatrics.
The information wasn’t provided by someone in animal science or the veterinary profession but by pediatricians! My initial reaction to the information in this article was: LIVID! I know this country has gone stark raving mad when this sort of lunacy is perpetrated under the guise of “safety”. I am utterly disgusted with this political push for safety which translated means: FORCE. Force you to surrender all your personal power so we can control you.
And the push to control everything about animals has been a constant and consistent onslaught. And now this. Telling parents that children are at risk when they own and interact with the following animals – they may as well have included the kitchen sink:
1. Reptiles – because they might all carry salmonella and cause digestive problems for children.
2. Hamsters – again because they might carry salmonella and also a virus called lymphocytic choriomeningitis that can cause brain inflammation and lead to permanent brain damage.
3. Hedgehogs – you guessed it, because they might carry SALMONELLA!
4. Monkeys – might carry herpes, meningitis, TB
5. Baby chickens – might carry salmonella
6. Ferrets – could bite. When ferrets attack: a new TV show
7. Prairie dogs – could carry tuleremia a flulike illness
8. African Gambian rats – might carry monkeypox
9. Big cats, raccoons and other wild animals – because they’re wild animals they may be too dangerous
10. Fish – could carry mycobacterial infections
11. Dogs and cats and pets OH MY! – could carry or transfer parasites, or cat scratch fever, bites, scratches, ticks, fleas…JOY?
I guess first of all they can’t count. Second of all it sounds like someone from the animal rights movement pushing to FORCE people to stop having ALL pets, especially exotics. And of course kids MUST not have ANY contact of ANY kind with ANYTHING that COULD make them sick.
And yet all the information the AAP gave to the author of this article was to scare (besides the agenda to end pet ownership that is) and to push VACCINES – for the children AND the pets! Oh yes, let’s not let a cat scratch your child but instead pump him full of drugs and vaccines that are causing things like autism and horrible allergic reactions and even death. God forbid that children should have any pet to learn responsibility, unconditional love and to build up NATURAL immunities.
And worse, do it in the illusory political fictional promise of safety so that parents buy it hook, line and sinker. Pun intended! The medical community would do well to go back and read the roots of their profession of which Nature was and still should be the major influence.
Let me just first put this all into some perspective so we can totally dismantle this nonsensical thinking that the technical, mechanistic drug machine is putting forth as truth – when in all reality it is laden with propaganda which is par for the course.
When I was growing up if someone had written something this ludicrous our parents would’ve laughed and ignored it. How else do we build our immune systems UNLESS they come into contact with germs?
A quote by Louis Pasteur – whom all allopathic medicine seems to thrust their ideology upon – said in his later years (the one quote the medical profession loves to ignore by the way) “‘The microbe is nothing, the terrain everything“. Which means the body itself is the issue, NOT the germ!
In some fairness the article said to keep proper hygiene but don’t go overboard with that either. Use soap, and wash your hands. You don’t need antibacterial soap – that is causing more problems than it helps.
That’s all my parents told us when we were kids – “go wash your hands before supper”. Sometimes it was “wash your face and hands” because my goodness children were allowed to play outside and even get dirty back then. And our dogs and cats were out there with us. Horrors!
And we held our gerbils, hamsters, guinea pigs, mice and played with them! Oh no! And what about those farm children who handle baby chickens? Salmonella??? No, no salmonella.
Did you know that ALL of us have good bacteria AND bad bacteria in our intestinal tracts? Did you also know that if the body is healthy the good bacteria is approximately 80% and the bad bacteria is 20%? What does the bad bacteria consist of? Salmonella, e. coli, and other SCARY microbes!
There is a proper balance in the body that comes through first supporting the immune system with a foundation of good nutrition – and I’m not talking about that ridiculous food pyramid either. But REAL nutrition.
And yes some of those diseases are pretty serious and can infect humans. But we can infect animals too and you don’t see our pets avoiding us.
And yes animals can and do bite – they are animals after all. Children can and do bite also!
It would behoove parents to do their homework on each pet BEFORE bringing them home. And do that homework WITH their children so EVERYONE in the family will understand the nature of that animal and what it needs to thrive. Then the biting, health issues and a world of other problems will be alleviated.
Bites and zoonotic diseases (illnesses transmittable from human to animal and vice versa) happen because people are so clueless nowadays to the needs and nature of the animals they bring home. They bring them home because they are “cool” or “cute” instead of understanding and knowing about the animals first.
We were required to learn about any pet before we brought it home. My colleague and very good friend, veterinary naturopath, Dr. Jeannie Thomason, said she had to learn all about the anatomy, physiology, nutrition, etc, before she was allowed to have the horse she so wanted to have. And all these years later we both are still learning about animals – AND from them, which to me is even more important.
We owe our pets and animals that much.
But to have pediatricians put out information such as this is just plain ludicrous. We are educating against these “annual” vaccines that do so much damage to animals only to have these pediatricians say to make certain pets have these annual vaccines as if that is the end-all be-all solution to all life’s little challenges.
And it also sounded like an animal rights solution. Make people afraid to own animals so they won’t own animals. It works, IF you buy into their propaganda machine.
I had guinea pigs, hamsters, gerbils, dogs, cats, and fish at home when I was growing up and my animals NEVER made me sick. We were responsible for the care, training and cleaning up of our pets. It taught us responsibility.
Our dogs and cats were loyal which taught us about love, kindness and not judging others.
And back then we didn’t vaccinate everything that walked and crawled either. We drank raw milk and ate unpasteurized foods and gee we not only prevailed we were healthy!
We did wash our hands, that was a given.
My dad’s family had every kind of farm animal – and we even touched the baby chickens and ducks (HORRORS) – and held them and did not get salmonella. Animals were raised NATURALLY then. They weren’t loaded with antibiotics, vaccines, and hormones which is making them sicker rather than safer and healthier nowadays.
We ate REAL food not all this processed junk loaded with MSG, corn syrup and genetically modified. So we were healthier children. And better behaved without all the excitotoxins that is in all processed foods everyone is eating these days muddling minds.
And we certainly didn’t hear our pediatrician tell us not to have pets or to beware of them. In fact, he left the job of pets and animals up to the experts – the owners! And sometimes the veterinarian. He didn’t presume because he was our doctor he knew all there was to know about ALL species just because he was at the perceived top of the food chain.
We caught lizards and held them and played with them – the little boys caught snakes and frogs and chased girls with them. We grew up healthy and far safer than the children of today who are isolated in their bedrooms playing video games, drinking sodas, eating microwave meals, with drugs to “fix” behavior issues and vaccines to supposedly thwart ALL encounters with ANY possible microbe.
We had cuts, scrapes, bumps, bee, wasp and ant stings, which we wore proudly – along with the bandaids we sometimes got – like the badges of honor of childhood. We romped and played with our dogs by our sides licking our faces, play biting our hands, playing ball and all the fun things childhood ought to be.
We played with our cats and they did scratch and sometimes bite us to teach us how to better respect their position as Cat.
Our guinea pigs, rabbits, rats, mice, gerbils and hamsters allowed us to hold them and carry them around and sometimes they bit us too! And we did not get sick, but we sure did learn to respect these little creatures!
We even ate dirt and mud pies just to see how it would taste AND to get dirty! We learned it didn’t taste very good and we did not get sick. Most importantly we had fun!
We cleaned out fish tanks and marveled at the lives we watched within those tanks. And we learned.
We learned about life, respect, honor, courage, integrity, caring, loyalty, responsibility and most of all love.
I’m glad I grew up when I did. And that animals played an integral role in our lives – in mine they still do. And all we did was wash our hands and eat REAL food! What a marvelous, healthy, MAJOR benefit these animals were and are to ALL of us!
On vaccines:
“Routine vaccination has adverse side-effects, either short or long term. With vaccines that are repeated year after year, the frequency and severity of these side-effects in our pets has increased dramatically. Most of the problems involve the immune system. After all, the immune system is what vaccines are designed to stimulate. But they do so in a very unnatural way that can overwhelm and confuse the immune system.” ~Donna Starita Mehan, DVM
Don Hamilton, DVM –Yearly “boosters” are unnecessary, provide no benefit if given (will not increase immunity). Thus boosters are either a legal issue (Rabies) or a manipulation issue (inducing clients to come in for examination rather than directly suggesting an examination).
Charles E Loops DVM – “Homeopathic veterinarians and other holistic practitioners have maintained for some time that vaccinations do more harm than they provide benefits. Vaccinations represent a major assault on the body’s immune system…. Vaccine induced chronic diseases range from life-threatening conditions such as auto-immune crises to conditions destroying the quality of life of an animal as in chronic skin allergies.”
About the author:
Copyright © October 2008 . All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reproduced in any form without the written consent of the Author. This article is for educational purposes only. The decision to use, or not to use, any information is the sole responsibility of the reader.
Dr. Kim Bloomer is an animal naturopath and published author, consulting on canine nutrition and wellness. She hosts the internet radio show, Animal Talk Naturally with colleague Dr. Jeannie Thomason. The two are also the Founders of the American Council of Animal Naturopathy. In addition, Dr. Kim is a proficient blogger and writer on natural pet health, having co-authored the book Whole Health for Happy Dogs, Essential Oils in Animal Care: a naturopathic approach, and authored the book Animals Taught Me That. Dr. Kim’s articles have been featured in various publications such as Animal Wellness, Natural Horse, Dogs Naturally, NM Breeze, Raw Instincts, and the Pet Connection magazines. Website:www.AspenbloomPetCare.com
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Kim Bloomer, V.N.D., N.D. is an animal naturopath as well as being certified in small animal nutrition, with years of experience in animal wellness. Dr. Kim is a published author, writer, and blogger. Subscribe to her DOGgone Newsletter for updates or to her blog via email. Copyright ©2005-2024 Aspenbloom Pet Care, Dr. Kim Bloomer, All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reproduced in any form without the written consent of the Author/Publisher. This article is intended to be educational. However, it is not intended to be a substitute for diagnosis or treatment from a qualified animal health professional. Dr. Kim Bloomer and Aspenbloom Pet Care, do not assume any legal responsibility for misuse of the products discussed in this article. The only essential oils referenced on this website are Young Living.
