When lethal medicines are this easy to divert, the stakes aren’t just veterinary. They’re national.
Australia’s veterinary prescribing system is still built on paper and trust, a sharp contrast to human healthcare, where prescriptions are independently reviewed and tracked. That gap has consequences.
The recent Gold Coast case, where euthanasia drugs were allegedly obtained through a fake charity and linked to as many as 20 deaths (Guardian, 2025), is the latest and most devastating proof.
A man with no veterinary training was able to access lethal substances and resell them to vulnerable people. This loophole is large enough to be exploited, with tragic consequences.
The structural flaws in veterinary prescribing
Australia’s veterinary medicine management system remains an outlier.
Unlike human health, where every prescription is reviewed by pharmacists and tracked through national databases, veterinarians can both prescribe and dispense medications with minimal oversight.
That means one person — the vet — carries the full weight of prescribing, dispensing, and record-keeping. With limited auditing and no national monitoring, the system depends almost entirely on professional integrity and paper records. For the vast majority of vets doing the right thing, this setup is both unfair and unsafe. It leaves them exposed, and it leaves the public at risk.
These safety risks aren’t hypothetical
The vulnerabilities of paper prescribing and self-regulation are not theoretical. They are already costing lives and undermining public trust.
- Between 2000 and 2018, veterinary drugs were implicated in 293 suicides across Australia (SBS Insight, 2022).
- Vets themselves face a higher risk of suicide and substance misuse, in part due to unrestricted access to lethal drugs (SBS Insight, 2022).
- Public misuse is rising — from illegal imports of veterinary drugs, to people consuming ivermectin during COVID-19, to opioid diversion in vet clinics (CDC, 2019).
- Inside veterinary practices, paper is proving a liability. According to VetScript’s Veterinary Prescribing Survey, 65% of vets say their biggest concern is duplicate or fraudulent script use resulting from paper prescribing.
Each of these cases shows the same truth: when prescriptions aren’t tracked or monitored, dangerous drugs slip through the cracks.
According to Veterinarian at Newtown Veterinary Clinic, Dr Jane Miller: “When a pet owner wants to take a script away from the clinic (noting we can’t do this for all medicines), our only option is to give them a paper script, and we have no visibility of what happens after that.”
Human health has moved forward, and animal health is being left behind
In human healthcare, the transition to e-scripts began in 2020. Since then, more than 219 million electronic prescriptions have been issued nationally (ADHA, 2025).
The federal government has announced it will mandate e-scripts for high-risk medicines, like Schedule 8 drugs, citing safety, reduced misuse, and better data as the drivers (DoHAC, 2025). These reforms are underway but not yet in force.
While veterinarians do not issue prescriptions for Schedule 8 medicines, they do work with and dispense a wide range of high-risk veterinary drugs. Without electronic systems, these remain managed through paper records and self-regulation, leaving the same vulnerabilities that human health has already deemed unsafe.
Why reform can’t wait
Every day, the gap between human and animal health grows wider, and these risks grow with it.
- Public safety: When lethal drugs like pentobarbital or ketamine aren’t tightly tracked, they can still be diverted or misused. The Gold Coast case showed how these substances can be obtained outside proper controls, with tragic consequences.
- Veterinary wellbeing: Paper prescribing leaves vets vulnerable to fraud, duplicate scripts, and diversion that can happen without their knowledge. Too often, they’re left carrying the blame and the emotional toll of a system that fails to protect them.
- Data & oversight: Human health now relies on national prescription monitoring to flag misuse in real time. Veterinary prescribing has no equivalent, leaving a dangerous blind spot in Australia’s medicines framework.
The cracks are already costing lives, and these delays in reform are an invitation for the next tragedy.
A better path already exists
Government reform is overdue, but veterinary practices don’t have to stand still in the meantime. VetScript already provides:
- Built-in traceability & compliance: Every e-script is secure and traceable, stored within the practice software, locked to the prescribing veterinarian, and fulfilled only by authorised pharmacies. This protects veterinary practices from tampering, strengthens oversight, and makes record-keeping simple.
- A native, faster prescribing workflow: VetScript works directly inside veterinary practice software, so prescribing feels natural and efficient rather than adding extra admin. E-scripts reach authorised pharmacies faster than paper, reducing delays and transcription errors.
But technology can only go so far without regulatory alignment. VetScript is proof that the safeguards already mandated in human health are possible in veterinary medicine. Until reform catches up, the system can’t be fully unlocked.
Closing the safety gap in veterinary prescribing
The Australian Government has already decided that paper prescribing is too risky for high-risk medicines in human health. That same commitment must extend to animal health.
When drugs this dangerous are circulating, the standard should be simple:
Electronic prescribing is the safest form of prescribing.
And with VetScript, veterinarians can lead the way — closing the gap before more lives are lost.
Show your support for reform: vote for e-scripts and play a key role in bringing animal health in line with human health.
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