By Helaine Olen

Earlier this spring, the British Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) released its recommendations for reform following an investigation into the nation’s veterinary sector, an inquiry prompted by the surging cost of veterinary care.  As expected, the CMA leaned hard on transparency, demanding disclosure of veterinary clinic ownership and the prices of common procedures and capping the prices veterinarians can charge pet owners for prescription scrips that can be filled elsewhere for less.

Will it help pet owners? Almost certainly, at least in the short run. But it falls short of tackling the major problem and a large contributor to the price surge: the growth of corporate and private equity ownership in the veterinary sector. The recommendations could, paradoxically,  ultimately exacerbate the problem it is meant to solve.

The rising cost of veterinary care is not simply a United States phenomenon. It is a global one, driven by several factors. The obvious one is the increasing number of people not just owning cats and dogs but considering them family members.

This societal change did not go unnoticed by large corporate money and private equity, which quickly moved in, purchasing veterinary clinics (not to mention other pet medical businesses ranging from labs to pet pharmaceutical distributors) at a rapid pace. In a period of a little more than a decade, veterinary clinics in Great Britain went from a majority independently owned to an astonishing 60 % becoming part of corporate chains.

And, sure enough, veterinary prices – as in the United States — began to increase at rates well beyond inflation as corporate parents attempted to wring more money out of the investment in the animal care sector, even as pet “parents” complained about shorter appointments with increased pressure from veterinarians (often under corporate pressure) to sign on the dotted line for more tests, treatments, and the like.

The emotional manipulation and upselling of services is bad enough. But there is another level of chicanery involved.  Many pet owners say they would prefer to use an independent veterinary clinic. But all too often, they have no way to determine whether the establishment they use is free of multinational corporate influence. That’s because many corporate owners do not rename or otherwise make their ownership obvious, preferring to maintain the illusion of local control.

As a result of such sleights of hand and information asymmetry, the CMA estimates British pet owners have spent significantly more than 1 billion pounds on veterinary services over a five-year period than they otherwise would have. That’s good for the bottom line of publicly traded and privately owned behemoths that control the majority of Britain’s veterinary clinics, but not for the personal finances of pet owners.  As in the United States, Britain is seeing an uptick in animals being surrendered to shelters because owners cannot afford care, and, like here, pet medical tourism is becoming a thing, with people going to less expensive locales for cheaper care.

All this counters the usual rationale for private equity and large corporate roll-ups in traditionally fragmented industries like veterinary services:  that economies of scale can provide cost savings for consumers – in this case, besotted pet “parents.”  If there are any significant cost savings here – a big if — the gains are not going to the pet moms and dads in the form of lower prices, but to investors in the form of increased profits.

The CMA investigation, which began in 2024, after the agency’s receipt of a record-breaking number of comment letters (more than 50,000) after they sought information on whether they should investigate further, did not recommend busting up the big chains – something that became unlikely once the Keir Starmer government moved to a more business-friendly stance.

Instead, the CMA doubled down on transparency, the idea that pet owners could become more educated shoppers.  And, to be clear, it will certainly be helpful, especially to diligent pet owners in non-emergency situations. There’s rarely an easy way for pet owners to compare the price of common services, leaving them even more vulnerable to price gouging. One doesn’t need to pay the highest price out there for, say, a basic pet neuter, after all. This is not a small issue. Here in the States, the consumer group Washington Consumers’ Checkbook has sent out secret shoppers to veterinary clinics a few years back, and they found variations of hundreds of dollars in the cost of basic non-emergency services such as spaying and neutering.

Similarly, forcing clinics to state their true ownership on signage at their premises will reveal to all whether local monopolies exist, and will also put a stop to consumers being tricked into thinking an establishment is a local business when it is not.

But transparency alone is far from a panacea. Not only do many people choose veterinarians primarily based on reputation and convenience, but it is also all but impossible to compare prices in an emergency, when, in my experience, many of the most egregious bills are racked up. The corporate presence is, moreover, particularly prevalent in veterinary specialty services, including emergency care.

The limits of the transparency push become most clear when you consider the proposed fix on veterinary pharmacy sales – that veterinarians need to inform clients that it is possible to buy pet-prescribed meds elsewhere for less money. (They are also limited in how much they can charge for writing the script.)

But the largest pet pharmacies in Britain are subsidiaries of the large veterinary corporations. Consider that Pet Drugs Online is owned by IVC Evidensia, the largest corporate veterinary chain in Europe. CVS Group – a veterinary chain in Great Britain, not related to the United States human healthcare behemoth – owns Animed Direct. VioVet is owned by Pinnacle Pet Group – which, in turn, is backed by JAB Holding Company, the owner of the United States chain National Veterinary Associates. (Compounding the matter: Smaller practices often pay more money for the medications they dispense, meaning that they might need to charge customers more for them, leaving them at a further disadvantage with price-sensitive pet owners.)

As a result, a reform meant to save pet owners money could quite possibly funnel even more money to what I like to call Big Vet, in the view of Dr. Scott Summers at the University of East Anglia’s Norwich Business School and Dr. David Reader at the University of Glasgow’s School of Law, who are currently studying the rapid consolidation of the British veterinary market. They believe the long-term upshot of the regulation could very well be to strengthen the veterinary behemoths the CMA investigation was designed to target, leaving them financially stronger and even more likely to buy up independent clinics.

Regulators would do better by putting a stop to corporate and private equity roll-ups of veterinary clinics by banning non-veterinary professionals from owning them, and conducting a concurrent crackdown on the loopholes that allow them to sidestep such regulation on this side of the pond. We here at Economic Liberties have put together such model legislation. One might say that’s a solution with real bite.

Helaine Olen is Managing Editor at American Economic Liberties Project, author, and a former columnist for The Washington Post.