Veterinarians raise alarm over anti-itch drug sold without Rx

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Dr. Vicky Smith was reviewing the medical history of her patient, a small dog brought in for lethargy, extreme thirst, a ravenous appetite and increased urination, when his owner revealed a surprising bit of information.

As Smith inquired about any medications the dog was taking, the owner said, "Oh, he's on cyclosporine," Smith recounted.

Cyclosporine is a powerful immunosuppressant used to prevent organ rejection in transplant patients, as well as to treat certain severe cases of rheumatoid arthritis or psoriasis in humans. Veterinary-specific forms of oral cyclosporine are approved for the treatment of dermatitis — inflamed, itchy skin — in dogs and cats. It is often used off-label for other immune-mediated conditions. Cyclosporine requires a prescription for sale in the United States, and Smith hadn't written one for this dog — nor, apparently, had any other veterinarian.

The client said she'd ordered it online and was unaware that a prescription should have been required. Her dog stopped itching, so she figured it worked as advertised.

Smith ran blood work on the dog and was alarmed by the results.

"His liver enzymes were through the roof," Smith said, worried about the possibility of liver damage. The owner, horrified, stopped using the product. The dog's condition improved right away.

Wondering how a company could sell cyclosporine without a prescription, Smith took her case to the message boards of the Veterinary Information Network, a community for the profession and parent of the VIN News Service. There, she saw her patient's case echoed in the experiences of other practitioners.

Two veterinarians located in disparate parts of the U.S. reported the same set of circumstances: A canine patient with a bigger appetite, increased thirst, more frequent urination — and a new anti-itch product in their routine.

Like Smith's patient, the other dogs had been given a product said to be cyclosporine that their owners purchased without a prescription. The source of the product in all cases was the same: a website called WagLabs.

VIN News emailed WagLabs and called the company's two phone numbers multiple times and did not receive a response. A search on whois.com, a free domain lookup tool, shows that the domain registrant is "Domains By Proxy, LLC." This is one of many similar services that allow for the actual registrant to be unlisted.

While it's impossible to know what is in the product without testing it — a process that costs thousands of dollars — Dr. McKinley Smith in Oregon wonders if the product contains cyclosporine at all. Her patient, a 5-year-old golden retriever, has chronic otitis externa and pruritis — inflammation of the ear canal, resulting in itchiness and pain. After being given the WagLabs product by his owner, Smith's patient stopped itching within 24 hours.

This was a "big alarm bell" for Smith. "Cyclosporine does not work within 24 hours," she said. In fact, it can take four to six weeks to see a response.

Even if it isn't the powerful drug it purports to be, practitioners are concerned that the product isn't benign, owing to the patients' signs of illness.

Products to alleviate allergies in pets are in high demand. Pet insurance company Trupanion reported in 2025 that it had seen a 7% increase in allergy-related claims since 2020. There are available veterinary drugs to treat skin allergies, including a medication called Apoquel that works differently from cyclosporine, but many online sellers tout alternative products as being less expensive or not requiring a prescription.

Faced with a plethora of online products of varied origin, the practice where Dr. McKinley Smith works put out a notice to their clients on Facebook and through email, encouraging them to stick with verified pharmacies.

"It's a new product, it feels like, every other day that someone's asking me about," Smith said. "But it's so good that they ask rather than try it themselves."

According to the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy, legitimate online pharmacies in the U.S. have these characteristics: They are licensed in their home state and in all the states in which they sell drugs. They require prescriptions from practitioners who have a legally established relationship with their patients or patient owners (clients) before dispensing prescription drugs. The drugs they sell are authorized by the federal Food and Drug Administration.

Escalating concerns

The WagLabs website advertises "clinically proven allergy relief for dogs" in the form of chewable tablets purported to contain cyclosporine, the same active ingredient as in Atopica, a veterinary drug made for dogs and cats. While both Atopica and generic cyclosporine require a prescription for sale, the product description on the WagLabs website states, "No prescription required."

Beneath the listing is a veterinary endorsement from a "Dr. Emily Carter, veterinary dermatologist."

"A few months ago, I started recommending WagLabs to all my clients. It contains the same active ingredient (cyclosporine) as Atopica but costs five times less than Apoquel or Atopica," Carter is quoted as saying.

VIN News determined that the photo of Carter is a stock image from the website Freepik. Meanwhile, veterinarians on the VIN message board were doing their own investigating and could not find a board-certified dermatologist by the name of Emily Carter.

Other practitioners escalated their concerns to the American College of Veterinary Dermatology. ACVD president, Dr. Andrew Rosenberg, looked into the website and the purported veterinarian and reached the same conclusion.

"Not only was that person not a veterinary dermatologist, we can't find that person's name as a veterinarian anywhere," Rosenberg said in an interview. He sent a notice to ACVD members on Jan. 21 and filed a complaint with the FDA. The agency has not yet responded to the college.

In Rosenberg's four years on the ACVD board, this is the first time the college has filed a complaint with the FDA. He hopes the website will be taken down as a result.

"I don't know what's in it. I don't know if there is medication in it. I don't know if there's not medication in it," he said. "There's a problem in each scenario."

While the FDA has not issued a public warning letter to WagLabs, VIN News became aware on Feb. 13 that the cyclosporine product was no longer available on its website. Clicks to the link now result in a 404 message, which means "page not found."

The phone number associated with the WagLabs Facebook page is the same as the one given for another pet-related web business. This company, Millionaire Mutt, sells dog bandanas. VIN News was unable to determine the company's location or leadership.

A post on the forum website Reddit indicates that Millionaire Mutt once sold an item listed as "Oclacitinib Chewable Tablet." Oclacitinib is the active ingredient in Apoquel. The product description on the Millionaire Mutt website specified that a prescription was not required to purchase the product. The listing has since been removed from the website, but a record of it is saved on the Internet Archive.

The oclacitinib product posting included an endorsement from a Dr. Emily Carter, the same name as the stock persona promoting WagLabs' cyclosporine tablets.

VIN News also noted that some images of pill bottles on the WagLabs website feature Millionaire Mutt branding, suggesting a possible connection between the two sites.

A link between seemingly different rogue websites is not unusual, according to the pharmacy boards association. A report from the organization states that most such operations belong to networks that operate thousands of internet domain names. "If one domain name is shut down, it causes minimal disruption because the network has thousands of backups," the report reads.

The vastness of the online pharmacy landscape isn't lost on Rosenberg of the ACVD; it's why he encourages awareness.

"As we get into this environment of more and more medications being ordered online, and you combine that with the rise in artificial intelligence, I just worry that we're going to be seeing more and more and more of these," he said. "I would just encourage [people], whether they are veterinarians, whether they are technicians, whether they are pet owners, to just really be aware of these and be vigilant. If you do see something, say something, because if the authorities aren't aware about it, they can't really do anything about it."

March 25 update: VIN News has learned that a pet owner in North Carolina this month submitted a WagLabs product labeled as a 50 mg cyclosporine tablet to a laboratory for testing. The results, provided to VIN News by the pet's veterinarian, show the lab detected only one major substance: dexamethasone. Dexamethasone is a potent corticosteroid used in human and veterinary medicine. In the U.S., it is approved as an anti-inflammatory agent for dogs and other species. A prescription is required for use. As of this update, the WagLabs website no longer shows any products for sale.

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