The Tip of the Needle by Catherine O’Driscoll

In 2010, Canine Health Concern (CHC), the organisation Catherine O’Driscoll formed in the early 90s, petitioned the UK’s regulator of veterinary medicines, the VMD, to withdraw the licenses for one-year canine vaccines against distemper, parvovirus and canine viral hepatitis (also called adenovirus).

The VMD was asked to do this because it is now scientifically accepted that “once immune to viral disease, dogs remain immune for years and probably for life” (World Small Animal Veterinary Association). CHC and its supporters felt that, by withdrawing one-year vaccines, our dogs would no longer be over-vaccinated with vaccines they do not need, and subjected to unwanted vaccine reactions, some of which can be life-threatening. At the same time, hundreds of CHC members wrote to MPs to ask them to support this request. No MPs took this issue up, and the VMD refused to take one-year vaccines off the market.

The question O’Driscoll asks in The Tip of the Needle is, “Why?”

Why is it acceptable to give dogs, cats, horses (and children) vaccines they do not need, or which come with risks that potentially outweigh the diseases we are running from? Why is this not illegal?

The Tip of the Needle is O’Driscoll’s story, because her friends who suffered are literally the tip of the needle of animal and human suffering. It is also your story if you are a parent or an animal guardian.

And it is a much bigger story—about corrupted science, corporations, governments, and the lies we are told, allegedly for our own good. Animal and human sacrifice is an ancient ritual, but it has yet to end.

www.catherineodriscoll.com