We discussed the banding and or microchipping of our pets.. I thought some of you might be interested in the article, published in the Winter 2008 issue of Wings West (SNPERRS newsletter), which highlighted points of another article.
RETHINKING MICROCHIPS
According to recent reports, several studies, including one conducted by the Dow Chemical Company, have linked microchip implants to tumors in rats. Published in veterinary and toxicology journals between 1996 and 2006, the studies found that lab mice and rats injected with microchips sometimes developed subcutaneous "sarcomas"--malignant tumors, most of them encasing the implants. Further, according to an article in the Washington Post . . .
--A 1998 study in Ridgefield, Conn., of 177 mice reported cancer incidence to be slightly higher than 10 percent--a result the researchers described as "surprising."
--A 2006 study in France detected tumors in 4.1 percent of 1,260 microchipped mice. This was one of six studies in which the scientists did not set out to find microchip-induced cancer but noticed the growths incidentally. They were testing compounds on behalf of chemical and pharmaceutical companies; but they ruled out the compounds as the tumors' cause. Because researchers only noted the most obvious tumors, the French study said, "These incidences may therefore slightly underestunate the true occurence" of cancer.
--In 1997, a study in Germany found cancers in 1 percent of 4,279 chipped mice. The tumors "are clearly due to the implanted microchips," the authors wrote.
Perhaps we need to rethink our use of microchips as a means to identify our exotic birds.
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