Drug India Uses in Cattle Is Killing Off Vultures
From Times Staff and Wire Reports
More than 90% of India’s vultures, a crucial link in the environment, have died, in large part by exposure to diclofenac, an anti-inflammatory drug and painkiller that is used in sick cattle but is toxic to the birds.
Efforts to ban the drug had been hampered by the lack of a suitable replacement. But an international team reported in the current issue of the journal Public Library of Science Biology that the drug meloxicam is as effective as diclofenac, but harmless to the birds.
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