Microchipping Dogs

Micro Chipping Your Dog
By:
Kifferi Franklin

Our four-legged friends, of the canine variety, can be loyal companions and members of our family. Important decisions that we make for our human children, such as vaccinations and safety, come into play and are just as important when there is an animal involved. Like a vaccine, microchips are injected using a needle and placed under the skin. They are small, roughly the size of a grain of rice and placed between the shoulder blades of the animal . Is cost an issue? Are there side effects associated with injecting this foreign body into an animal? Does the wand reading the chip emit more radioactive energy than needed? Should it be made into law that all animals, dog and cat, be required to have a chip? When does the government have a right to step into your lives and mandate what can be injected into your pet? Does micro chipping your pet make it safer than not micro chipping? Is it a better alternative to tattooing?
Microchips alone will not guaranty the return of a pet. It is merely a secondary method of identification. Collars and tags are pet owner’s first line of defense when an animal goes missing. Proper address and/or telephone numbers, along with the pet’s name and owner’s name, give missing animals their chance to return home. However, collars can slip off or break. Tags fall off. Micro chipping your pet can give another method if these fail.
Here in the United States, there are roughly 130 million cats and dogs that we call our pets. However, only 5 percent have microchips . Cost can be a factor when determining what we choose to protect out pet with. Prices can range from free up to $75, an amount of money many people might not have for a small injectable chip . Regular office visits, vaccinations and county pet fees can become pricey and adding this additional cost is not something people may want to incur.
For many years, tattooing was done as a form of identification. Dogs were given tattoos on either the inside flap of their ear or on the abdomen. On many occasions, tattoos can fade and dark-skinned dogs would not be able to show the tattoo. The information tattooed on the dog could become confusing, with people trying to put more information than needed. People who found lost dogs that were tattooed were sometimes unable to help the animal because they did not know what exactly the tattooed information was . Micro chipping does provide a more centralized way of tracking pet owners, with the assumption that each owner is reporting the right and current information with said micro chipping company. Animal shelters are designed to contain and control lost animals, many becoming non-kill shelters. Reuniting lost animals with their owners becomes a much easier task when a microchip is found on a dog. Sadly, many animals that are not micro chipped do not have the happy ending as their cell mates. A recent study of 7,700 non-micro chipped dogs, only 22% were reunited with their owners . This same study produced a result of over 51% of micro chipped dogs reunited with their owners. Do these numbers mean the process is working? Are the risks involved outweighing the side effects, while small in numbers, still occur? Does an increase of 30% give dog owners a settling piece of mind if their beloved pet is turned into an animal shelter or local veterinarian’s office? There are numerous micro chipping companies, however, none of them use the same technology. There is no universal wand to read the chips. In 2009, the AVMA, AAHA, World Small Animal Veterinary Medical Association and the ASPCA came together in support of an ISO standard . One company, HomeAgain, had their wand tested and was able to read a better level of sensitivity over the others. ResQ scanners were unable to find the Avid chips and vice versa. Also in 2009, the American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) launched a website allowing pet owners to register their pet with four of the seven companies who microchip. The website, www.checkthechip.com, was launched by a private company in California . This website, sadly, is no longer up and running. It has been replaced by http://www.petmicrochiplookup.org. Currently, the state of Wisconsin does not require any permanent form of identification . Neither does Minnesota, unless the animal has injured someone . However, Santa Cruz County in California is meeting on December 9, 2013 to determine if they should make micro chipping dogs and cats mandatory. A proposal was given to Governor Jerry Brown in 2011, hoping to require every animal retrieved from the shelter receive a microchip, he rejected the proposal. The current proposal would make each owner financially responsible of the microchip before their pet is released to them . Many places in the United States are currently enforcing their mandatory micro chipping. Countries like Ireland, New Zealand, Malta, Norway, Switzerland, Austria, Croatia, Italy and Portugal have mandatory requirement for pets . Currently, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) recommends that all dog owners have either a microchip inserted or a tattoo placed on every dog they own for identification purposes . As with any foreign body injected into a person or animal, side effects can and do happen. Are these risks enough of an amount to deter most animal owners? The British Small Animal Veterinary Association (BSAVA) maintains a database of any and all adverse reactions to the implantation of microchips in animals. Since the database began 1996, over 4 million animals have been microchipped. With this, only 391 adverse reactions have been reported. Of these reactions, the microchip migrating away from the injection site is the most common problem reported. Other problems, such as failure of the microchip, hair loss, infection, swelling, and tumor formation, were reported in much lower numbers . Extreme and rare cases of death have been reported. There are benefits to making microchipping your dog a mandatory regulation. For many animals, their owners simply abandon them either in a shelter or worse, on the side of the road. With no collar device or microchip, the owners can never be found. This eliminates the process of prosecution if there is a need. Another benefit, as many recent events have shown, is for fighting. Many animals are bred to fight. Innocent dogs are used with cruel techniques, turning them into killers. If the dog was microchipped, it could be traced back to the owner, who would then have to answer for any offense that the dog may have committed .

References
(2010). USDA.
Barnes, J. (2013, June 4). The facts about microchipping your dog. Retrieved from http://www.cesarsway.com/dog-care/new-dog/Facts-About-Microchipping-Your-Dog
Found Registry. (2013). Retrieved from How does microchipping work: https://microchipregistry.foundanimals.org/help_and_faq.php
Home Again. (2013). Retrieved from How microchipping works: http://public.homeagain.com/how-pet-microchipping-works.html
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Lau, E. (2009, August 26). New company aspires to clean up pet microchip mess. Retrieved from http://news.vin.com/VINNews.aspx?articleId=13737
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McCord, S. (2013, November 3). Santa Cruz County considers mandatory microchipping for cats and dogs. Santa Cruz Sentinel. Retrieved from http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/santacruz/ci_24446925/santa-cruz-county-considers-mandatory-microchipping-cats-and
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References: (2010). USDA. Barnes, J. (2013, June 4). The facts about microchipping your dog. Retrieved from http://www.cesarsway.com/dog-care/new-dog/Facts-About-Microchipping-Your-Dog Found Registry Home Again. (2013). Retrieved from How microchipping works: http://public.homeagain.com/how-pet-microchipping-works.html Import regulations Lau, E. (2009, August 26). New company aspires to clean up pet microchip mess. Retrieved from http://news.vin.com/VINNews.aspx?articleId=13737 Lau, E Micrchipping of animal faq. (2013, July 30). Retrieved from AVMA: https://www.avma.org/KB/Resources/FAQs/Pages/Microchipping-of-animals-FAQ.aspx Milan, C Schilling, C. (2010, March 24). Dogs suffer cancer after id chipping. World Net Daily. Retrieved from World Net Daily: http://www.wnd.com/2010/03/131533/ Terrestrial Animal Health Standards Commission