> Self-medication is a specific therapeutic behavioral change in response to disease or parasitism. This case challenges the conventional view that self-medication behavior is restricted to animals with advanced cognitive abilities, such as primates, and empowers the science of self-medication by placing it in the domain of adaptive plasticity theory.

General observations suggest it is likely that other plant-feeding
insect species engage in self-medication because of the ubiquity of
dietary chemical defenses, and the substantial frequency of
parasitism among herbivorous insects.

In conclusion, our demonstration of self-medication through a
shift in the extent of pharmacophagy by G. incorrupta caterpillars
points to the possibility that more animal taxa than previously
believed self-medicate and that known behavioral and physiological
mechanisms can mediate self-medication even without
associative learning.

Citation: Singer MS, Mace KC, Bernays EA (2009) Self-Medication as Adaptive Plasticity: Increased Ingestion of Plant Toxins by Parasitized Caterpillars. PLoS ONE 4(3): e4796

[One point against the no-treatment folks. What if bees are out there picking up drugs to self-medicate?]

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