Preface

At some point of my veterinary career I started realizing that our domestic pets are plagued with several life-shortening and -threatening conditions that are scarce among their wild and stray counterparts. Being a veterinarian, I have the luxury of observing and treating animals during their entire life spans, which makes it much easier to acknowledge and research the issue. In this article, I would like to present some thoughts in logical order to explain the nature of so called modern pet diseases. My patients’ and my pets’ health issues as well as influence from some of my fellow veterinarians and progressive clients helped me to formulate my opinion on the subject. It is important to remember that such “discoveries” have been made already and I do not consider myself a pioneer in this area.

Pet vs. wild

Stray animals and mixed breeds are product of natural selection, survival of the fittest, whilst pure bred and pure bred mixed pets are products of human selection. Unlike mother nature, human selection does not favor exclusively the strongest and healthiest individuals but more likely those good looking or behaving ones.

The health conditions that are overrepresented among all our pets include obesity, hormonal imbalances, allergies, autoimmune and immune-mediated conditions, cancer, orthopedic conditions, and I am unhappy to report, that I continue to link more and more of them.

To be fair, stray and wild animals have their own problems, which usually include infections, infestations, wounds from accidents or fights, or results of exposure to extreme temperatures.

Once these facts caught my attention, I could not help noticing how differently domestic and wild animals deal with the same conditions. Wild animals frequently struggle more or less with their medical problems but most of them hold their own.

Pet animals are much more affected by those. Example? It takes sometimes a couple of fleas to induce flea bite hypersensitivity in a domestic dog or cat, while the stray dogs and cats walk loaded with fleas, and secondary tapeworm infestations (fleas are tapeworm carriers) or other infections (Bartonellosis), sometimes to the point of being anemic, but more often than not they hold their own.

Mechanism of a disease

Most of diseases are a function of genetic predisposition and external environment. Genetic predisposition roughly means that the individual has some genes that make it easier for some beneficial or destructive processes to occur. Having “bad” genes for example, does not mean that the bad condition will happen, but there is a greater chance for it to materialize. Unfriendly environment may activate bad genes and make the predisposition a reality.

Along with oxygen and water, food is one of basic environmental factors necessary to survive. Genomes of animals and humans have been evolving for millions of years. Carnivores evolved eating other animals, herbivores eating plants, and omnivores eating both types of food. We have been farming for roughly 10 thousand years and this is how long our carnivore pets could have been exposed to foreign foods, but it is during the last few decades, that we started giving our dogs and cats grain based diets. By doing this we keep their good genes subdued and make their bad genes express, in other words, most modern pet foods are nothing but modern diseases waiting to happen!

Carnivore Pet Foods From Worst To Best

In my opinion, the worse pet food is mainstream off the shelf popular brand of food loaded with grains, dairy, preservatives, appetite enhancers and many more bad ingredients for a carnivore. Unfortunately, these are the vast majority on the market at this point.

Luckily, there are more and more pet food manufactures that offer grain free foods. Is grain free food better? Yes it is! It does help to prevent or control many modern pet diseases, but I still see some limitations within it. Grain free foods, just like conventional pet foods are still preserved by high temperatures, canned food gets sterilized and dry food – baked. Those ultra high temperatures disable many important micronutrients.

Raw food is the ultimate diet for a carnivore. It consists of muscles for protein, organ meats for vitamins and bones for minerals. It is grain, dairy, soy and preservative free. All thermolabile biologically active substances are preserved. It has a natural for a carnivore flavor, and foremost, raw food is what a carnivore body is designed to eat and thrive on.

Epilog

Healthy nutrition keeps our pets in great shape and allows for a long and healthy life. It prevents, improves and frequently cures majority of modern pet conditions. Treatments for modern pet diseases that do not take into account proper diets are often just temporary and symptomatic fixes. Proper diet is a huge if not most important part of well being and medicine. I prove it in my practice every day. We really are what we eat.