Mental health pills for pets? The rise of psychiatric medication in dog behaviour therapy

WE LOVE our dogs like family. They greet us with wagging tails, comfort us on tough days and ask for little more than a walk and a treat. But lately, a question has been quietly echoing online and in vet clinics - “Are we medicating our pets for just being themselves?”

- VUYILE MADWANTSI

A recent viral TikTok video by content creator Dr Jef has stirred the pot on pet parenting, sparking a fiery debate about whether we've lost sight of what it means to let animals just be animals. The clip zooms in on an unsettling trend: more and more dogs are being prescribed psychiatric medication like Prozac, not for serious mental health disorders, but for simply behaving like dogs. Barking. Chewing. Running wildly around the house. Behaviours that were once shrugged off as part of the canine experience are now being “treated” with pills.

And it’s not just social media buzz. Data backs it up. Dr Diana Neil at the UK’s Royal Veterinary College analysed data from over 2.3 million dogs and found that 1 in every 500 dogs was prescribed Prozac for behaviour-related issues. Just a decade ago, that number was 1 in 10 000. The reasons range from barking excessively and chewing furniture to showing separation anxiety or general restlessness.

Research confirms that mood stabilisers for pets, often the same ones prescribed to humans, are becoming more common, especially post-lockdown. Covid created a generation of “lockdown puppies” who missed critical early socialisation.