With the entry into force of the Animal Welfare Act For nearly a year, animal shelters and shelters have been suffering from dog abandonment, the opposite effect of one of the law’s objectives.
Its implementation has generated many doubts among the population who own a pet or are considering having one in the future. so many uncertainties which are causing scenes never seen before by animal shelter and rescue officials who They are overwhelmed by the continuous arrival of petsespecially dogs, in addition to being surprised by the conditions in which they arrive after being abandoned.
Law to protect animals
Without a doubt, the Animal Welfare Act, promoted by the Ministry of Social Rights, Consumption and Agenda 20230which has a significant impact on animal rights and welfare according to information and testimonies collected by OKGREEN.
This law, still in the definition and development phase on many aspects of the regulations, “aims to implement legal mechanisms in order to promote animal protection and prevent the high level of animal abandonment in our countryinvolving public authorities and citizens in respecting all animals”, as specified in the approved text.
They rip out their microchip
Dogs that appear with cut wounds on their necks to remove the microchip, suffering from malnutrition, fleas, ticks and psychological damage. These are the terrible conditions in which abandoned dogs arrive. and which have overwhelmed healthcare systems in many regions of Spain since the arrival of the new animal welfare law.
We interview the President of the Association for the Protection of Animals and Plants of Vigo, Andrés Leónwho knows first-hand the problems that the law generates, not only for leading the entity, but also for having managed a shelter until recently.
OKGREEN: Are there more abandonments of dogs, cats or other types of pets following the implementation of the animal welfare law?
Andrés Leon: What is most abandoned are dogs. Because cats live in feline colonies. What appears is a lot of cat litter. But it does not necessarily have to be directly related to animal application, as is the case with dogs.
Q: Why is there a mass abandonment of dogs?
A: With dogs yes, because there were a lot of people who misinterpreted the information… The law was still being drafted, on many aspects and when they started reading that you had to have insurance, that you had to have a collar, that they had to have a muzzle, if they couldn’t let go…
Many people began to fear such things that could lead to administrative sanctions and began abandoning their dogs left and right.
Even something that was seasonal, like for example in late April and May, people who were getting puppies as gifts at Christmas, well, those puppies, at three, four, five months old, they started getting abandoned in the summer, just before people went on vacation, a lot of dogs were also abandoned.
Today, abandonments remain linear almost throughout the year. In other words, it is now continuous and the dogs arrive in worse conditions. We had not found ourselves in the same sanitary conditions with abandoned dogs like these.
But we have never found animals here in Vigo with cuts in the neck to look for the microchip, remove the implant so that they cannot be located.
Q: Is this something normal in the rest of Spain? Do you have news from other shelters and shelters that have noticed this increase?
A: Yes, we are all overwhelmed. In fact, here in the Vigo region there is a shelter that has had to close its doors to foster families because they cannot cope, they cannot manage the number of animals that come into a more rural area. People abandon more in rural areas than in the city.
Q: Do they abandon them due to lack of information?
A: I understand that due to a total lack of information, we find more and more animals in worse health conditions and much further away. Because people also think that an animal that, suddenly, after 10 or 12 years, is already your family, one day discovers a pathology related to the age of the animal, such as a kidney problem, a heart problem, a blow or Whatever, the cheapest and easiest thing is to abandon it.
Q: But when you abandon an animal, you risk a fine…
A: Fines and administrative violations represent a very significant economic amount. But since there are still many dogs that do not have a microchip and there is no way to locate their owners, they hide behind them and abandon them. Once these animals are equipped with a microchip, it will be more difficult for them to escape an administrative sanction.
But I repeat, This year we found several animals whose necks had been cut to locate the microchip. and take it away so they don’t find it. In other words, truly animal.
Q: What would be the solution?
A: Awareness, dissemination from a young age, in schools and institutes, basically… Everything goes through awareness alone. Make people aware that if they have a pet, they will give you everything, a dog that when you have it at home is the one that comes to greet you when you arrive, it is the one that cries when you leave the house. It is an unconditional and absolute love and there are people who abandon it later. It is incredible.
Q: With the implementation of the Social Protection Law, do you think it was rushed or done incorrectly?
A: Yes, I think it fell like a stone, all of a sudden, without there having been a prior process of explaining to people that the law on animal welfare must actually exist to protect these animals. They left out the protection associations in the drafting of the law, because we are the ones who work on the ground, day after day, twenty-four hours a day.
Q: Are there more dogs being abandoned than before because of the Animal Welfare Act?
A: Yes, for example, for us the average number of abandoned animals that we collected in Vigo was 3 or 4 per week and now we are between 9 and 10. With the law, more than twice as many dogs are abandoned than before.
Q: The municipal councils in all this problem, how do they receive it, how do they manage it or how do you think they react?
A: Well, by avoiding the problem, basically… What we’ve noticed, for example, is that we have more support when it comes to local police, for example, by showing up and running a microchip reader to locate the person in the database. owner and try to return it to them.
But we are seeing more and more situations where the Local Police are writing a report. If the owner is identified. Good. And if not, stop at the shelter. In other words, there is no basic solution to work with.
Q: But with the situation you have most mentioned, it would be necessary to increase the space to house the animals…
A: They can’t cope, more dogs are abandoned, more animals are taken in than can be given up for adoption.
