I drove up to Wendell Veterinary Clinic in Newport, New Hampshire the other day, about a fifteen-minute drive, and stood in the downpour under my umbrella outside their Covid window.

In return for handing the young woman my folded check for $60–I whipped it over super-fast since the rain was coming down hard between my umbrella and her window–she handed me a bag containing one Bravecto. It’s a miracle pill.

Back home, Samson our dog ate the chewable with great glee, thinking it was just another tasty snack, snorting with delight down there on the kitchen floor.

“What have I got for that boy?” I’d said, building it up like I always do when I’m preparing to give him a snack. No different from Pupperoni, which he adores, or Dentastix, which are minty and good for his, well, dog’s breath.

Bravecto. It’s a miracle pill because Samson is no longer in danger of contracting Lyme Disease for the next three months. Ticks, fleas and any other nasty little arthropods that crawl onto him, once they bite and dig in, well, all of them die in about six hours. His blood has become poisonous to them. Deer Ticks, the tiny carriers of Lyme, don’t have time to transfer the nasty bacterium called Borrelia burgdorferi (scientist Willy Burgdorfer discovered the spirochete in 1981) into Samson’s bloodstream. Instead, the ticks die and dry up, flaking off by themselves. Wood ticks, too. All of them.

The active agent in Bravecto, I’ve learned, is called fluralaner. It’s revolutionary. A stunning advance in veterinary medicine. Gone are the days of flea collars and combing through my dog’s fur for blood-filled bugaboos.

Why am I writing such an unnecessary post about something so mundane? Because 400,000 people a year contract Lyme Disease in the U.S. It’s treatable, but only if you recognize its complex symptoms early enough. Otherwise, you can be messed up for life.

As a man who used to run in the woods in total abandon, fearless and free, busting through thickets and crossing tall grass fields here in New Hampshire, at least until Lyme arrived and the woods became a place to worry about, I have a glaring and probably obvious question to ask.

Where is my Bravecto pill? You know, my human version?

Please, Big Pharma, you could sell millions and millions of these pills. How about it, Merck?

Guys like me would buy them every three months.

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