New World Screwworm Risks for Pets | SOP Ep. 125 - Dr. Christopher Lee

Welcome to "Speaking of Pets". I'm Dr. Alice Navati-Jeroman, a board-certified veterinary dermatologist, and I'm not. I'm Janet Navati-King, the doctor's sister, podcast co-host, pet owner, rescuer, and lover. We're here to provide pet owners with science-based information to help them be the best pet parents they can be. Here's today's episode. Create a "Just for You" and your pets. Hey everyone, welcome to the show. I know it's not casual Friday, but it's casual Thursday. And we are taping right before the July 4th holiday, so you guys will probably see this afterward. But I was very concerned about three particular parasite-slash infections that are really going around in this country that both our pets and us can get. So who do I go to? Our parasitologist, public health specialist, Dr. Christopher Lee. We love having him on as a guest, and I told him to dress casual too. Something new about Dr. Lee, besides his hosting VetWatch, his podcast, which I love, is he's an assistant professor of microbiology at Lincoln Memorial University College of Veterinary Medicine. So that's kind of a new development since we've seen him. But thank you, Dr. Lee. I always love having you as a guest and Janet. One other thing, Dr. Lee is the inventor of the word edutaining, because he not only educates us, but I keep telling him he needs to be a stand-up comic. Edutainment. Well, thank you for that great, very gracious intro. It's always good to see you. I always love talking to you. Back at you. Janet, you know what we're going to talk about for the first time we have to. Not so thrilled to see the sister Janet. I'm okay with that. Janet's, by the way, is in her new remodeled office last kitchen, so we're very happy. This is my husband's side. Truth be told, I have to stage it because once he puts his stuff up there, it ain't going to look like that. That's right. I would turn this around and show you Mr. Jerome's desk, but no, don't. Please don't. Right. I need to put a match to it. Right. Anyway, the first, the first bad disease we want to talk about. And everyone needs to be aware of this is screw worm. And I know it's got a funny name, but it ain't funny, right, Dr. Lee? No, it is. It's like this, because it's like this. Is it screw worm? That and just, I mean, the way in which it eats and it looks. So the name, the genus species is, it has a great name, Cochlamia, hominivorax, which means spiral maggot, human devourer. So it devourers human. So if you look back in the literature, too, there's a lot of cases, especially with prisoners in South America, when we back in the ancient times, that they were dying from being eaten alive by screw worms. And the name hominivorax, which means the devour of humans. Wow. You can get screw worm. I thought it was just cattle. Oh, you know, no, not just cattle. If you're warm blooded and have a pulse, they will eat you. This is why we're talking about this today, Janet, because nobody gets it. Yeah, in fact, that's one of the crazy things, too, is when we typically think of maggots, we think of, oh, you know, dead bodies and, you know, you're watching a movie, CSI, and you come up and they have the maggots. Most, a lot of maggots, which are called secondary maggots, or facultative, they prefer decaying material and or bodies. Um, but screw worms, and they like their, their beef grade A, they want nice flesh that you and I would, you know, again, throw on the grill. So they will eat living tissue. And that's where we get into primary my ISS. And in since 1966, we've not had any primary my ISS here in North America, actually from Central America on up. And now that it is back, it is problematic because while, you know, the secondary maggots will eat on like a corpse of anything, these primary my ISS, they are very nondiscriminatory as long as the flesh is fresh. Um, they want to eat it. And so there's some, if you go on YouTube, there's some crazy ones where you go in like you scope into someone's nose, and then there's a whole little metropolis going on there. Wow, I think I'm going to have to go to throw up. And fly is the whole thing right here. It lands on them and then lays the larva. Yeah, the fly itself. So with flies, you go from egg to larva. And then you, oh, especially with this one, you have three, um, in stars, or basically where they get larger as a larva, then they turn into a pupa, and then you have the adult flies. The only part that's eating and living off flesh is the larva, so which is what we call a maggot stage. The pupa usually drop off of the wound at night, and then very quickly they will hatch and become the adult fly. The adult flies cause no, no real problems, but the females will hunt out for wounds and that fly up to a couple miles a day to do so once they find a mucous membrane or anything just as little as a tick bite. They will lay an egg. They will lay eggs, usually a couple hundred within 12 to 24 hours. They've hatched and they're growing. And part of their life cycle is under optimal conditions. It's only a few weeks. So they can turn over very fast. And there's actually, if you look back at the literature to some of the prisoners that were being affected by the screw worm, they would write about how it's a very bad but distinctive smell. And so the flies are attracted and so you'll bring in more. And so you can go from an animal that is only has a minor scratch to a very life threatening situation in a very short period of time. Today's episode is sponsored by Dr. Tim's pet food. Learn more at DrTim's.com. So that's the fear, right? Is it it's killing the animals, right? Yes, and it actually will do it almost in a very gruesome zombie, like way. If you go back and you look at the key deer that we had, which was in the BC there. Yeah, they're so sweet. The problem with that is the pictures that you'll find on on CDC and USDA website. Those deer are more alive shortly, just prior to those images being taken. Those deer will put down. They're eating all the way into the brain. It's really kind of crazy. How are these, how are these like herds in it's in Texas right now, correct? How if I had a herd of cattle, how would I even check for that? Yeah, I mean, they're looking, I mean, you go and you scratch your cattle and you're, you know, looking for any kind of open, open wounds. But the problem and this is one of the many, many costs is that they can develop so quickly. You just, you know, the monitoring of that head of cattle. It's just not, you know, quite as feasible. It can take up mass losses and in South America where it's endemic, you know, they're a little bit better managing it, but you can have 10 up to 30% herd loss due to screw warm. It's not usually that bad because they have a better, and they know what to do. But that is not an unrealistic situation in a bad controlled scenario. And those are just margins we don't have in, in the US. So it's going to have some dramatic impact on beef prices and our whole economy as well. And it's not going away. The thing that, in fact, I'm doing another, doing another podcast in a couple of weeks where we're going over that. But, I mean, I would be, I'd be great to be proved wrong. But I would be surprised if we don't have, it doesn't take till 2029 to, whoa. And now how many dogs have it? I read the two or is it more than that? No, were they farm dogs? Do you know? So I have, and I apologize. I have not gone and take a look at the recent. For current updates, the best place is screwworm.gov. That's very thing was when I looked at the site, I was like, oh, this is going to be bad. And my friends are like, what, what do you mean? I was like, look at it. Is there running ticker? Oh, yeah. Even on that site, they have it, but they're prepared. And if you look at the way that site set up, it's, they're expecting the numbers to, it just kind of explode out. So anything that we say today is going to be outdated. Right. Yeah, but it is treatable. I mean, like, let's, what do you do? Isox aslings. Um. Your Quattro, Next-Guard combo, some Pericotrio. Now, some Pericotrio is not if I am correct, has not gotten the emergency use authorization. The other three of the four isoxazillines do have emergency use to treat. There is nothing that prevents in pets. - Okay. - However, I will tell you that while they don't have that on the label, everybody's working on it. And in my opinion, I would be absolutely gobsmacked if all of the isoxazillines did not prevent. - Yeah. - Yeah. - I also read what Nut and Pyram, which is what Capstar. - Capstar. - To those of you there. - It does. I always, it's one of those when I lecture too. And when I used to run an ER as you know, Alice. And I love Capstar, but it's day is gone. - Yeah, yeah, it's gone. You're right. - The only reason I brought it up is 'cause it's cheap. - It is cheap and it's used a lot. And that's one of the things is whenever I had my isos, which is your maggot, a maggot case, I would have my technicians running for the Capstar and they pop it in rectally if the dog wasn't able to take something orally and it serves to kill all of your maggots. - Yeah. - Well that's fine except we have isoxazillines now. - Yeah. - For not a lot of, I mean it is a cost difference. But if you look at the cheapness of Capstar for 2448 hour fix versus a one month fix. - Yeah. - Yeah, I mean to me it's a no brainer. So the message that, I mean the big message I would say is if you're worried about new world screwworm, get all of your dogs and cats on year round if you take heartworm prevention and you should not have a problem. - So how is the screwworm maggot different than like a regular household fly maggot? - Yeah. So the regular household fly maggot is going to be secondary myisis. And if you're like a geek like me, it's always funny, right? Alice, when you always know when you have a maggot case in the hospital, if people running in both directions, you don't have to be worried, you don't have to be worried. - You don't have to be worried, you don't have to be worried, you don't have to be worried and you don't have to be worried, you don't have to be worried. Because they know it's about to happen. And we use those a lot of times for forensics too, you know, if you have someone who's, you know, dead and you're trying to establish time and death, you can actually help out with that. In fact, I, funny story or not so funny story, I ended up accidentally getting somebody beat up over identification and so what happened was they brought me, there was a dog, they, they come home from vacation, their dog had maggots all throughout, they came to see me, retreated, got the, you know, dog on pain medication stabilized, we cleaned all of it. Anyways, he's, the owner goes, well, how long has it been infected? Well, I was like, well, you're talking to the right person because I actually, you know, identified this disease in the time and it's been at least 11 days. So he went back and beat up his, you know what, that happened to me too, but in a different way. Somebody ran a puppy into our office because the regular vet was three doors down from us and were with the dermatology clinic and they said, this puppy just got hit by a car and I said, bring it in, it wasn't hit, it was kicked and you can tell the difference with, I mean, when I felt his chest, I felt that crepidus and I'm like, son of a, so anyway, yeah, but you can really, it's, it's almost like we're detectives at times. Right. And it's like I didn't, didn't mean to cause that problem. But to get back to the original question, those other common, uh, facultative, my diocese, uh, like some muskah species like your domestic housewife or, uh, your, like Lucilla, which like the green bottle fly, they need a chronic tissue. And so that is also why if you look back, like in some ancient texts or even not, maybe not ancient, but older, like civil war, a lot of the people did better with wounds in the field than they did in the hospital because it was pre antibiotics. So the most maggots in North America, if you have maggots in your body, they're actually doing you good, um, they're eating dead, dying tissue and they're kind of pushing sepsis off. Like cleaning it up. Yeah, they're cleaning it up because they will only eat to the margins or dead tissues. Yeah. Primary my ISS, which is your primary screw worm or your older old screw worm, which is not on this continent, um, they only eat living tissue. And there are other ones too, like, um, some are kind of species specific. Um, there's one that, uh, it's horrible, but they eat baby birds, uh, but they will read it. I was gonna ask you if there was one that eats birds, uh, screw worms will as well, but there are some here actually a little bit more, um, particular about their host. That's one of the devastating parts of new world screw worm is as long as you're, um, living in tender, uh, they will be eating it. Wow. So when, when people get it, it, how can I say, do people live on these farms where the screw worms seem to have affected the cattle or you can just get it, like, I don't live on a farm, you know, I'm saying, I get it in my backyard, can I get it in my backyard? So if you were in an area that had school, I'm like, let's just hypothetically, you, you know, there is a screw worm fly, a female, uh, pregnant, um, fertile female, uh, screw worm in your backyard and you and your dog, uh, taken nap on the hammock, you could, they could have laid eggs right, you know, by your eye and within 12 to 24 hours, it's eating into your skull. Oh my god. Now, so it is, I mean, it is, and now that makes us sound like very, like, apocalyptic and I don't mean for it to be quite that bad. When we take a look at it and why does cattle keep coming up? They're massive pieces of meat. That is why we use them for protein production, right? So you have large animals, lots of them, they're getting scuffs and little bruises all over. They just end up being able, by a percentage wise, out doing our numbers on, on that, um, my knowledge, there's no, like, I don't know that they sit there and would go, oh, let me go to beef over, over sheep, um, it's a living wound where I'm going to hone in on it. But the cattle certainly are able to exponentially, uh, increase these numbers and they hit us from a production standpoint. And it's a particular problem on anything that is endangered, because they can kill so many so fast. And that was the problem with the deer, was that when that came in, it was right at the time that the velvet was shedding. And so it ended up just kind of being that perfect, um, scenario. Perfect timing. What about like these rescue groups that are rescuing dogs like from China and not China, I'm sorry, Texas and New Mexico and they bring them up like to Janet, to Connecticut. Is it transferable like that? It is definitely transferable, um, they need pretty warm areas. Okay. We got that going on, yeah, yeah, and that is part of it. So in certain parts of like, let's say the screw worm or you just put them in every state and try to see what happened there, uh, there is a lot of stage where it would be a seasonal situation. Okay. Whereas like why live it's day, everyday around in Florida, because it's humid, it's warm, it's kind of a screw worm paradise. Janet has, um, an interesting story that happened to her the other day to talk about our [BLANK_AUDIO] next parasite, when you called me and I didn't even know who it was on the phone, it was the coyote. So I am a justice to the peace and I marry people and they want to be married down in this park on the beach and I'm walking to the beach and they're doing some stonework and this guy said to me, "Are you alone?" and I was kind of like, "Well, yeah, but I was afraid of the humans." And he goes, "Well, I just want you to know. My boss and I just saw three coyotes." And so I said, "Oh, good to know." So I hung out where the men were working, waiting for the bride and groom, you don't meet them, they kind of show up and all this. And I said, "I'm going to walk in with you guys because there's coyotes." So blah, blah, blah, they get married, this photographer is there, blah, blah, and I'm like a third wheel. So I'm like, "Well, you know, I'm going to head out and I'm thinking, yeah, I'm going to feel pretty good because the guys are working, they're loud. Just as I'm getting to where the guys are working, the coyote jumps up on the wall. I mean, probably 10 feet from me, maybe 12 feet. Steers me down and does, you know how dogs do that thing, they sniff in the air and they're trying to get my scent." And I'm like, "All I had was a water bottle on my phone, a marriage license, and of this diary I use." So I took my phone and I hit the button and I'm going, "Make a siren. Make a siren sound. It's going, I can't do that." You know what I'm saying? So I. I know marriage certificates are pretty dangerous, you should have thrown that out of it. Throwing one at it. The marriage certificate. Well, I don't get a tip. I know what I'm just making. You don't throw anything at what you're supposed to is not hit them. You just throw it to the side or something. So here I am. I went like this and I stomped with my face. It's a pretty big thing. I'm pretty big like this and I went, "Ahhhhh! No need to help me, by the way. I'm sure those guys could hear me. And I'm screaming and then it jumped off the wall into like the reeds. And now I'm like, "Oh God, now I got to walk past it." So I kept doing this and as I'm walking past, it's going, "Ahhhhh! So, day later, our police department closes down that path and puts out a warning that there's a mama coyote with four of her kids." You didn't step in the poop, did you? Because that's what we're going to be talking about. No, I didn't step in the poop, but now I find out I can get something from that thing. I'll let you handle that tactically. So are you leaning me down to conococcus? I am! Wait a minute, wait a minute, I even wrote the word down. Wait a minute. I kind of cock it. It starts with it. Oh no, that's the next thing. Oh, okay. Here's something we love about Dr. Tim's pet food. Every formula starts with a question. Does this actually help the animal? Not just look good on a shelf. Dr. Tim has spent decades as a working vet and that experience shows up across the entire product line. Whether your dog is a little overweight and needs a healthy balanced food to help shed a few pounds or could be a picky eater who won't touch their breakfast without Dr. Tim's vagabond freeze-dried toppers or just a regular couch companion who deserves real nutrition in every bowl. Speaking of pets is committed to bringing you science-based information and partners that align with that mission and Dr. Tim's is a great example of nutrition done right. For every pet, not just the athletic ones. Head to Dr. Tim's pet food to find the formula that fits your pet's life. So a kind of conoccus, I mean, so right now, I don't know. I hope this does not get people upset. But when we think about the combination products, right, a flea tick heartworm, there's a lot of discussion on that too because I think everyone is trying to figure out what is the best one, which one should I? And there is one that does do tapeworms, which so a kind of conoccus is a type of tapeworm. And if you haven't heard of it, it's not super common, but it is horrible. It can kill people, it can kill dogs. And in many cases, even with the very best of medicine, it is incurable. So it is a very scary one. And so a Lanko makes a medication called Quattro that does have prosicontal, which is a dewormer for tapeworm. So we'll take care of it. So I think that that and there's also been a couple of publications because when we thought about it, it's interesting. So I love tapeworms. I just think tapeworms are so fascinating. So glad somebody does. I know, right? And like the mystery of why I'm single is because people are swiping. But I wanted Dr. Lee to talk about it because everybody sees coyotes now, no matter where you live or everywhere here. Yeah. So tapeworms are just so fascinating because there's truly like from Hamlet, there's really a method to their madness. You take a look at it and it's almost as if they've really thought this all through. But with tapeworms, with only one exception, all of the various tapeworm species out there require an intermediate host. So you have an intermediate host where your asexual multiplication occurs, and that's where the damage occurs. And then there's a definitive host where the sexual reproduction. So can we do like an example, like a mouse has the tapeworm? Then what happens? Yes. So no, I'm getting there. Okay. But let's take echinococcus granulosis, which is the, it's the sheep one. Okay. And this is so if you are, imagine you're a tapeworm, right? Okay. You want your forever home. These things last, some tapeworms, depending on the species can live decades. They are the longest tapeworm. The blue, the blue whale tapeworm is actually longer than the blue whale itself. Oh my goodness. So it's the longest and the longest animal on the planet. I just, I love tapeworms. That's crazy. But they're, they can live like a decade. So if you were a tapeworm, my gosh, your goal is to get in your definitive host. Because it's awesome. You don't have a GI tract. You just feed off of what they're feeding on. So you have these little hooks that you, attach into their small intestine. And then you just kind of hang out and you're going to live for a decade. You're going to eat, you know, if they're having pizza, then if you're having pizza, they are too. And they're right. They had pizza and they are nonstop sexually reproducing. So if you're a tapeworm, it's pretty kush gig. You're in a nice warm home, nonstop sex and fit for 10, 10 years or so. And then I don't know. There you go. So what, what is part and the reason I frame it that way is that's part of the method to the madness. Yeah. Is that for a conococcus grainy losis? They will get into sheep. So sheep are the intermediate. So you have the tapeworm inside of the dog. Okay. They're having and that be part of the reason it's tape is they're long flatworms and they're. Each segment is male reproductive and female reproductive systems. And they're making a bunch of eggs. And then that slowly turns into a little perguotted or packet of eggs. Then you shed those eggs. Well, those eggs go out into the environment. And so you have a dog out amongst the sheep. They go to the bathroom. The rain comes. And now you have those viable eggs sitting on the plants. The sheep come and eat it. Now that gets into the sheep. Well, that's your intermediate house. So they're going to multiply. Okay. And they're going to do asexual multiplication. But here's where the crazy thing is. Many parasites. It's a good general rule, but it's not by far not an absolute. Often will be much very nice to their their definitive host, right? Which if you're going to have a place where I am going to be here for 10, 20 years. And we're going to eat and party all the time. Why would you just you just leave it alone. But your intermediate host, you're kind of anxious. You want to grow up. You're like, let's kind of get this going. So they often the asexual reproduction is where a lot of the damage occurs to our animals. Okay. And so this is also why with small animal veterinarians, we don't talk a whole lot about a lot of other tapeworms, just because as definitive hosts, the tapeworm is helping you out. Yeah. It's not doing anything negative, right? Maybe not helping you, but not doing anything negative. With sheep, they'll give multi-locularis. I'm sorry. And that was going off on this. We're talking about grinylosis, but there's a tiniya multisaps, which is very similar to that. It's going back and forth. So let me back up. So there's a couple that go from sheep to dog because that's a very common thing. Grinylosis will get into the sheep. It kind of causes grinylosis. The dog eats the sheep and then it goes back. Tiniya multisaps is also that same pattern. They'll actually cause a brain masses. It's not the sheep and cause something called gid. And so it's a way they become staggering, neurologic, and they'll have like large, these large masses. And so they actually become dilitated, so it helps further that. Grinylosis doesn't quite do that, but it does get into the sheep liver, and it can cause some problems as well. So that's kind of your sample going back and forth. When we think about granulosis, e-granulosis is worldwide, but you need sheep. Okay. So where the big thing in topic now is is econococcus multilocularis. Right. That one is scary because the intermediate host is rodents. Now you would sit there and think, okay, you got coyotes, you got rodents, so this thing is everywhere. Yeah. Well actually very geographically limited. Oh. We don't know why, but part of it is because we probably don't have it's rare and we don't have really good ways of looking for it until recently. So there was a recent study where they looked at one of the major laboratories and they looked at over two million samples that had PCR done. PCR is really your great way of taking a look at it because you look for genetic material. Tapeworms are very much underdiagnosed. In the very common cat plea tapeworm, if you look at a standard fecal versus PCR, you're going to have 19 times more positives. So you're missing, you know, dozens. Every time you diagnose a plea tapeworm, that your client sees or you see visually. If you're not running PCR, you're missing dozens, at least more than it does. So we know that they're underdiagnosed, but because they're also not causing any damage to your dogs or cats, you know, it's on a lot, right? We don't run it. But now that PCR is getting cheaper, we see it. So there was this study, two million PCRs and what was shocking was that we had cases in Seattle, Portland, Colorado, the Chicago area, and areas where we really weren't expecting them, and except for one of the cases, none of them had travel history. That is where it comes in. Now where this balance comes in is now we're like, okay, we'll let's sound the alarm. This is crazy. We need to get everybody on monthly proxies. Yeah. Maybe. I don't think it's wrong. I mean, I do like prozoquantal, and I speak quite a bit, you know, just in full disclosure, on Quattro, but I speak for a couple of the other companies as well. I think that there's a balance. Do we need prozi for everything? I think there's pluses and minuses to it, but if you're concerned, I do think it is a great thing. Do note that out of those 2.3 million samples, the number of cases of the conococcus was 26, I believe. Oh. So, I mean, to put it in perspective, but we've actually had, you know, if you're in an area that you're worried about it, and there's, that is only one of many other tape lines. So, if you're worried about just tapeworms in general, and there's a lot of things that prozi will take care of above and beyond that as well, you know, it's something to consider. So I think that there's a lot of discussion on, and I think people are fully on board for absolutely prozi, and then those that are, you know, it's irresponsible to use it every month. I'm kind of, I'm kind of in between, I don't think that we're going to, I don't worry too much like why all resistance is always an issue, and we need to be very judicious with how we use these medications. So, prozi conoccus has been out there forever, forever, and we haven't really been seeing that. So I don't think that the sky is going to fall down if we use it at the same time, the sky is not falling down when we have it, so it's an individual conversation. But depending on where you are, if this is something that you're concerned about, you know, the Quattro is a really great option for those people, and for those that are saying, you know what, I don't need to worry about Quattro, you have Nexcar combo and trio that are both fantastic products that still take care of your, your rounds, your hooks, your heart worm, your fleas, your tics and all, and probably new world score. When it comes to feeding our pets, we believe in results you can see over hype, and that's exactly why we're proud to partner with Dr. Tim's pet food. Dr. Tim Hunt is a practicing veterinarian who spent decades formulating nutrition for every kind of pet from the laid back lab dog to his own I did a ride sled team. Check out Dr. Tim's pet food and see what science-back nutrition looks like for your pet, they'll have a shiny coat, more energy, healthy weight, and more, because every great adventure, even a nap on the couch, starts with a healthy pet. You know, so that's my question is average Joe pet owner. You know, Libby gets her, her heart worm and her tick medicine every month, right? Which is due today. Is she covered? Do I need to worry about anything else? What are you using? What are you using? You tell me, Ellis. I think she's on interceptor, or are you on heart guard for heart worm and the other one, Cordelia Cordelia, Cordelia, but she's not on the quadro, you're just unplained Cordelia. And she's inside out, outside dog, and so are our cats and our cats are killers. Yeah, so that's what I was seeing up a mouse yesterday. So all dogs and cats in North America would be better served to be on flea tick heartworm prevention. And I think that there's a lot of different options that you can do. Right now, there is Zowetis makes pro heart 12, so it's a one injection for all year for heartworm and there's a one year flea and tick product as well. So there is options for that. At the same time, you know, I think having two different products is a great way of going. I think for convenience, a lot of people like these combinations. And so quadro goes ahead and takes care of so many things all at once. But again, so this trio, next for combo, I think it's kind of, there's pluses and minuses to absolutely all of them. And the one thing despite, I think the one thing that we should always look at is it does not matter which one you pick, right, or some in one, not all in ones. And the, to me, which product is the best, it's the one that gets inconsistently to the pads, you know, I also would state that, you know, I think you brought up a really good point genit of, you know, well, my cat indoor outdoor and a hunter, yeah. And that is one of the problems is that does not matter. I think that it, I may increase risk, but it, but being not in that, and I talked to so many people like, oh, no, my cat indoor, each patay on a literal silver platter. I guess we bought this at an estate sale, it is, it is silver, blah, blah, blah, blah. And we're in a gated community. So I don't give my pet anything, oh, no, no, no, it says that I'm in a gated community. Like it keeps my favorite one is, I'm in a gated community, so we don't have mosquitoes. We live in a very small bar, sir, um, so I always like talking about nature's door dash, right? Remember the old Jurassic Park nature finds a way, Jeff Goldblum, if you fly as in cockroaches, oh my gosh, those things like your musket domestica can transmit all types of internal parasites if your cat eats it. So I always ask clients when I'm in the room, you know, for that indoor pet cat that doesn't mean anything. Your cat ever eat a spider? Oh yeah, right. And a lot of times they're like, yeah, now he's great at that. I'm like, yeah, if I had a cat, that would be their main job. Like if they're not eating spiders, we're having a sit down. That is your whole job. That's nothing else of you. But if they're eating arthropods, many arthropods, not spiders, many arthropods are a paratonic or faredic transfers of various parasites. And I'll send you a really great article that you can pop into the link and a couple of tables that I made off of it. But the list is actually stunning of what cats, indoor cats can get. So what I, my big message is every dog and cat in the United States should be on flea tick heartworm year round. This one. You're around. Sure. We are. We are. Yeah. And we'll take care of, you know, a lot of these now again, you know, things like a kind of caucus. If we're not on prosy, there's great products like some pericotrio, next group combo, those do not have it. But again, if you're not, you also should be doing rodent control just generally. Sure. You need a whole series of videos on hauntifiers recently. Yeah, you know, so I mean, well, really don't want to be living with road to how cool those cats, the cats are our Rogan control. We call them Orcan. Yes, I like it. I like it. And you know, I have to be honest, we've always had indoor outdoor cats, and I know people get upset about that and blah, blah, blah, but they're happier cats. Well, where you live because you don't live like on a busy street. You're like back in the woods. I mean, people can't even find you kind of like us. Yeah. Yeah. So, but you know, they know in the morning, they're like, I'm going out. They're not putting on their pocket protector. It's going to work. Yeah, they get very excited. It's a hot topic. I mean, they're pros and cons on both sides. I know. Yeah. For some places where I lived in Southern California, you had indoor cats and you had coyote food. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Right. So, I mean, there is there was that issue too. And then, you know, when you take a look at the decrease in our nation's songbirds, there's a large factor with indoor outdoor cats because now I mean, if you take a look at the cats, you know, that they descended from like in the wild, they typically have like a three mile radius to themselves. Now they're, you know, you got 10, 20 times that in that radius. And they all have food and medical care. And the songbirds are screwed. So, yeah. Again, I'm not definitely going to stay, you know, taking extremes on anything, it can be, you know, in a lot of the cats too, like your 18 year old cat that's indoor outdoor, is she really taking down a bunch of bluebirds? Probably not. Okay. We're going to run out of time before we talked about, I want to be the one to say it. Crypto sporidiosis. That's close. Crypto sounds like death. Yeah. Yeah. It comes from hidden in that particular one. And it's a very, very, very small parasite. But to me, it's one of the reasons why you, I don't know, kind of start with water parks. Oh, right. And now, is that something, baby diapers, like I can get from a baby diaper that someone, like just let me go. You're in anything good from a baby diaper. My God, my God. Sometimes I had to close that pool in California because of a baby Ruth floating by. Well, my mother used to go to the Y swimming. They called everybody out of the pool, the old people because they had to get the 2 to 2 rolls out. So, okay. So remember to, like, when you go, like, we think of our young childhood days and the chlorine pools and that's how I wanted that smell. Okay. So here's the problem. And I'll send you a link because they were an article two of the one question needed to ask yourself before you get into a pool. Oh, God. I just went to water class this morning. Okay. So here's the thing. If you have a properly chlorinated pool, yes, you do not smell chlorine. Oh, when you smell chlorine, it is from chloramines. And that is reaction to things like sweat. You're in feces. Oh, so it kind of, it's plating it off. It kind of activates the smell. It breaks down. So remember, part of the reason like what we like about reactive atoms is that they, you know, they bond and they do their things. We have chlorine that is out there going to bond. So, chlorine by itself, when you have a properly chlorinated pool, it smells of nothing. When you have a tipsy roll going on by, the chlorine is going nuts and you're getting chloramines. Yes. Oh, this fresh cleat. No, no, no, no, this is the aftermath. Wow. So actually, that's kind of why I like chlorine pools over sailing is at least you know of. Yeah. Nope. Nope. So actually, the company I worked for in California, the last club we built that had a new pool, they use ultraviolet light. It was a new system where it went through this like lighting system. Does that work? Oh, so a lot of these things. So let's get back before we go on that like the salt water chlorine. I mean, there's a lot of reasons to move away from chlorine and there's a lot of ways that are better and I don't disagree with that. Yeah. But let's say that you have a great UV thing and so you have a little tipsy roll that goes on by and it gets UV'd and it's all taking care of it and still on floating on bot. Oh, I don't know. I don't know. So to me, the one question you need to ask yourself is before you hop into pool is would I bathe with these people because that is what you're doing. That is literally truly what you're doing. That's why it's funny because I love like a Roman history and I remember going up to bat and you know, with a few people and they're like, oh my gosh, I would never go into a bath house. I'm like, well, how is that different than a pool? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we call it that and definitely in the US in today's world, bath house does kind of mean something else. But from a standpoint of just the water, you're getting into a pool and most people they bathe after you're supposed to bathe before. I don't know that that rules taken super well. Where do you think this current research is of it? Because I just saw it on the news. Big infectious disease taking hold across the country. I'm like, whoa, what is that? And then I read it as cryptosporidiosis. Yeah, I don't worry too much about that. I do that. It's just low news day. I mean, that problem is and that's probably and then it also comes back to like, you know, like people go against cruise ships. And I love going on cruises. It's my favorite way to travel. But part of the reason why cruise ships get hit is that from an epidemiologic standpoint, they're gold. We have the data. We know who's there. We have all the data to run it. So it doesn't necessarily mean that it's that much worse. I would say that, you know, I've never been into a restaurant where as you're walking in, they have a wash your hand song, you know, and then like wash your washy. I'm like, so cruise ships really go out above and be on their way. And if any cruise ship ever wants to sponsor me and I love cruise ships. But I do feel like, you know, a couple of the cruise ships. Yeah, we will. So with that, but I think that from an epidemiologic standpoint, we can track it with our parts. It's trackable and they know where we know who's coming in going out. But the problem with cryptosporidium is a couple of things is because it's a parasite and not a bacterium. It's hearty. And that's one of the things like when I talk to my students, the whole reason that you take biology and talk about pro-carriotes, where they're simple like a bacteria with no nucleus. And then you carry out, it's like all of us, right, my fellow you carry out. So it's crypto. So that creates a level of complexity and it also makes it harder to treat. Well, a lot of the basic things that we use to sterilize for bacteria does not work on crypto. So pouring, they're highly resistant to chlorinated pool, cryptosporidium will be just fine. So if you have someone that comes in with some rage and diarrhea, if it's from Samanilla Campobacter, okay, yeah, it's so gross because it's part of the water that you're enjoying and splashing around and swallowing, but it's all dead bacteria. Crypto is not. The second problem with crypto is it has a very low infectious dose. So there's a lot of things that only think about viruses, bacteria, and we think about that are not that right, that from one infected individual, how many do we get? Crypto becomes a lot easier to get infected from because while usually it's a little bit over 130-ish oocysts that you ingest to get infected, you can get infected with this little as 10. That is very unusual and they're insanely small. So the fact that it has a very low infectious dose, they are shed in mass amounts in diarrhea and that it's resistant to a lot of sterilization methods. They become these big issues and then when you have situations like pools, water parks, cruises where you also can track who's coming in and coming out, you get one person that gets out and gets diagnosed and then we're able to track it back. And it's unfortunate because I feel like a lot of times companies that are doing the right things get punished for it. You know, there's been some green onion, E. coli outbreaks. Yeah, I want to say it's been like Chipotle and Taco Bell and people like-- And tomato. I never eat there. I was like, - Yeah, there are a major chain that's actually doing the right thing to help you at any rate. So I feel like risk life is risk, right? So we should go out and live your life to me that doesn't always involve jumping into a pool, but I love curses and I do hop in the jacuzzi. So there you go. We all have to pick our battles. So I think it's not going to kill you most of the time. It also, there's a lot of species to it. So that's the other thing is that there are some that do get cross over to humans. So it is zoonotic and there's some for which are not zoonotic. - Today's episode is sponsored by Dr. Tim's pet food. 'Til next time, keep asking questions, keep learning and keep loving your pets. But you can get that from a petting zoo, can't you? 'Cause my classmate, when we were doing cows, she got crypto and she was in the hospital for days and days so dehydrated. - Well, yes, and then it's also one of those, yes, but they can also get it from you too. So a lot of times, when the problem is something that because a lot of times who goes petting zoo is children, right, just like water parks. And so a lot of times, they give it to the animals as well. So it's kind of a both, two way. But not all cryptosporidium is zoonotic and there's a lot that are maintained just amongst ruminants too. - So as we're talking, I got breaking news. FDA issues highest risk recall for popular potato chips. - What's wrong with them? - Dry milk seasoning with possible semonellic contingency. It's zaps, dirty potatoes. Uts, which is a huge brand. - Oh wow, we had an up salesman for a client. - I remember that. - Borsal baskets full of all kind of stuff. - Yeah. - And one more thing popped up. Taylor, if in Travis Kelsey, her donating $26 million. - Oh yeah, I knew that. - And one of those is the ASPCA. - Oh good, 'cause I didn't see any animal ones on there. - It's ASPCA, so we're like the food pantry and all that but no animal, okay good. - 'Cause she's a cat, she's a cat person. - I'm gonna wrap it up and I have to ask our doctorly or our comedian. So what is, here's your guest question 'cause you're a two-timer. So what is your party entrance song? - Oh god, that's such a loaded question. So at Fetch, we had to do a walk on song. - Yeah, yeah. - And I have gotten so much negative feedback for my walk on song. - Oh, what is it? - You tell. - Well no, because now I, I mean, I guess I don't understand the proper, what is a proper walk on song? I just picked the song that, when I'm feeling, like a little pick me up, it's a song that is always my go to. - Yeah. - Which is, it's Tin Man by America, but it's not. - Oh yeah, that's a good song. - It's a great song, it's again, if you're younger, you probably have no idea what any of it is. - No, you know what I'm talking about. - Yeah. - That's, I think that's an excellent choice. Well, we-- - I listen to a lot of Yacht Rock, hence love the cruises. - Have you watched the documentary on Yacht Rock? - Wait, have you watched the documentary on Yacht Rock? - I have not. - Oh, it's fabulous. - It was very good. - And by the way, I had the pleasure of meeting Michael McDonald in the '90s, he did a gig where I worked. He was stoned out. - Yeah, well, if you read his bio, he doesn't really remember any of his-- - No. - He's like, "Hi, doing it." I still like him, I think he's a good guy. - He's talented, he's incredibly talented. So-- - And Taylor Swift is donating all that money to ASPCA, then much love of-- - Not all, not I agree. - It's a whole variety of charities, but it's 26 million. - Love you Taylor. - Love you. - Many thanks to Taylor. - Love you, Travis. Well, thank you for using all of those incredible vocabulary words which will not work in my word all today. (laughing) We-- - I could just go on and on about all of this stuff. - We got to get him on a cruise, Janet. - Well, I think we got to get him on hinge. And, you know, and don't mention tapeworms, 'cause he said the only thing. Don't mention tapeworms in your bio. I don't think that's a good entree. - Yeah, yeah. - I should mention that. - Well, even on the first day of my date. - And date. - No. - But-- - Yeah. - With the big key takeaway for everyone watching. If you're a veterinarian, veterinary professional will be pushing flea tick heartworm medications. Trio, nexarcombo, Quattro, year-round protection for all of our pets. That will take care of, of all, should protect you from new world screwer. Definitely it's already a couple of those are licensed for emergency use for treatment. So at least with every month I would take care of it. In my opinion, they are most likely to prevent. And if you are worried about tapeworms, the addition of using Quattro is another option. - Yep. - And I have to tell ya. Libby, like she loves getting that every month. - Great product. Mine just got it today. - Yeah. - Yep. And that's one of the great things about those three options is that consistency and taste is a little bit variable. So if you're petting yourself in like one, there are other options as well. - I agree. - It's nice to have multiple great options, but all three of those are fantastic products. - We are so lucky in this day and age with those products. - Do you remember when we graduated? Oh my God. There was, I'm sure remember there was the number one product - Program. - 19. - Lucen, you're on. - Yeah, but there was a house bomb. And I have to look back on my nose, but it was in, it was 1993, the year before Frontline came out. - Oh. - And one of the, it's still sold, but it's a newer generation. But the old generation, the label stated, you had to turn off all of your pilot lights. - Yes, a guy. - I do remember that. - Yes. - So these kids now, I mean, if you're a young pet owner, it's like here, take this once a month and it takes care of all of these amazing things. Back in our day would be like, so get the, any children that you like out of the house, turn off your pilot light so you don't burn your house down. - Right. Yes. We have come a long way. I will say that. - Right. And in the 1980s, there were more dogs dying from fleas. - Yes. - And kid. - And that was before the parvo vaccine was launched. - Yeah. - Wow. - That's true. - So parasites are just crazy. - Thank you so much. We appreciate you. And thanks for taking the time to educate our listeners and hey, listeners, thanks for listening. Thanks for tuning in. Thanks for sharing, liking, loving us. And don't forget to send in your questions. You can email us at soppodcast.com to piece in there. And Alice, what do you wanna say? - I just love having Dr. Leon. I just, to me, it's like a whole comedy hour but I've still learned something. - I did. I learned a lot. I learned a lot. Thank you so much and we'll see you next time. Bye everyone. Bye everyone. Pet's podcast is an SLA video production.