On November 22, 2009 my husband and I decided to worm our horse Tex with a product called Ivermectin that we bought over-the-counter at a local feed store for a mere $2.99. We read the instructions and proceeded to inject the paste like product into the mouth, up into the cheek area between the teeth and the cheek ...as instructed. As the horse received it, he naturally stuck his tongue out to adjust it in the mouth and attempt to swallow it. When he did that...a small piece of the treat which we had given him earlier fell out of his mouth and without a second's notice, my dog Sheila darted in to grab it and consume it. Sheila an Australian Shepherd is a livestock dog, she is around livestock all the time at the ranch and this is no unusual occurrence for her to lap up the scraps left behind or dropped by both cows and horses. No mind the slobber it is a very natural thing for them to do; sheila was just being a dog. When Sheila grabbed the treat and ran off...we didn not give it much thought since #1) it was such a small amount of the paste attached to the treat and #2) we had purchased the product over the counter at the feed store and assumed it was safe. Much to our dismay, just 2 hours later...we found our beloved dog Sheila behind the house on her side in violent tremors and foaming at the mouth. We rushed her to the nearest Emergency Animal Hospital only to learn that the product Ivermectin marketed by Durvet and manufactured by Bimeda, Inc. (the most commonly used livestock wormer) is known in vet circles to be highly dangerous to dogs and more specifically to Collies and Shepherds, the same dog used to control livestock on ranches all over the world. Even my own vet said he wished this drug had never been allowed to be sold over the counter (FDA relaxed controls just 4 years ago at the pressure of these multi-million $$$ pharm companies). Six hours later, it was determined that the drug had basically fried my dogs brain, and we had to make the very difficult decision to put her down. This is a travesty and I want the FDA to remove this product off store shelves immediately, it obviously needs to be appropriately administered by a doctor of veterinary medicine just as other drugs (which are as lethal as this) are managed and controlled. I would ask that you do not buy or support this product or ANY product that includes the ingredient Ivermectin which is in many of the livestock wormers being sold today.

Follow-up on May 21, 2010: Yesterday I finally recieved a return phone call from a Dr. Coles at Bimeda offering to reimburse me $230 of the more than $3, 000+ emergency vet hospital bills we incurred during the nightmare experience. Of course that was contingent on me providing them a full release of responsibility. No thanks! I would rather tell the whole world of your pathetic antics and do what I can to save other livestock dogs from such a painful and horrible death.