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Euthanasia
peta.org
Approximately 6 to 8 million animals are handled by animal shelters in the U.S. each year. Even though some are reclaimed or adopted, nearly 4 million unwanted dogs and cats are left with nowhere to go. Animal shelters cannot humanely house and support all these animals until their natural deaths. They would be forced to live in cramped cages or kennels for years, lonely and stressed, and other animals would have to be turned away because there would be no room for them.
Trying to build enough animal shelters to keep up with the endless stream of homeless animals is like putting a bandage on a gunshot wound. Turning unwanted animals loose to roam the streets is not a humane option, either. If they don’t starve, freeze, get hit by a car, or die of disease, they may be tormented and possibly killed by cruel juveniles or picked up by dealers who sell animals to laboratories.
Euthanasia literally means “good death,” and true euthanasia—delivered by an intravenous injection of sodium pentobarbital—is painless, quick, and dignified. Because of the high number of unwanted companion animals and the lack of good homes, sometimes the most humane thing that a shelter worker can do is give an animal a peaceful release from a world in which dogs and cats are often considered “surplus.” The American Veterinary Medical Association and the Humane Society of the United States agree that an intravenous injection of sodium pentobarbital administered by a trained professional is the kindest, most compassionate method of euthanizing animals.
Unfortunately, some animals will be killed by municipal officials using unacceptable and cruel methods, such as gunshot. Bullets are often not placed precisely in the struggling animal’s head or are deflected, and some animals survive the first shot only to be shot again and again.
Many animal shelters still use outdated gas chambers to kill animals who aren’t adopted or reclaimed. Even the “best” gas boxes can expose conscious animals to the horror of watching other animals in the box suffer from convulsions and muscular spasms as they slowly die. Old, young, and sick animals are particularly susceptible to gas-related trauma and will die slow and highly stressful deaths.
And as hard as it is to believe, there are still facilities in the U.S. that kill animals using painful electrocution or cruel decompression chambers, which make the gases in animals’ sinuses, middle ears, and intestines expand quickly, causing considerable discomfort or severe pain. Some animals survive the first go-around in decompression chambers and are recompressed because of malfunctioning equipment or an operator’s mistake or because they get trapped in air pockets. They are then put through the painful procedure all over again. For more information, click here.
Until dog and cat overpopulation is brought under control through spaying and neutering, we must prevent the suffering of unwanted animals in the most responsible and humane way possible. Euthanasia, performed properly, is often the most compassionate option.
The only way to stop the suffering of the innocent victims of companion animal overpopulation is to prevent their births through sterilization efforts. Every last one of the millions of animal deaths at animal shelters and in the streets, alleyways, fields, basements, and back yards that occur every year could be prevented through spaying and neutering. You can help. It’s as easy as ABC—animal birth control.
Please do not allow your companion animal to be needlessly euthanized during times of crises. Take the appropriate steps now to ensure that he or she is well taken care of even after your divorce or death.
For more info see how PETA saves animals.
Animal Shelters
peta.org
Not all animal shelters are the same. Fortunate homeless and unwanted animals end up in the hundreds of open-admission animal shelters that are staffed by professional, caring people.
At these facilities, frightened animals are reassured, sick and injured animals receive treatment or a peaceful end to their suffering, and the animals’ living quarters are kept clean and dry. Workers at these facilities never turn away needy animals and give careful consideration to each animal’s special emotional and physical needs.
To be able to offer refuge to every animal in need, open-admission shelters must euthanize unadopted and unadoptable animals. The alternative—turning them away—is cruel and leaves the animals in grave danger.
Many less fortunate lost or abandoned animals end up in pitiful shelters that are nothing more than shacks without walls or other protection from the elements, where animals are often left to die from exposure, disease, or fights with other animals.
So-called “no-kill” or “turn-away” shelters, which are supported by supposed animal rights activist Nathan Winograd, have the luxury of not euthanizing animals because they turn away needy ones whom they deem unadoptable. Many keep waiting lists, which compromise animals’ safety by leaving them in situations in which they are clearly unwanted. Where do these unwanted animals go? The lucky ones will be taken to clean open-admission facilities that have responsible policies about euthanasia and adoption.
But many animals who are refused by turn-away facilities are dumped on the road, in the woods, in the yard of the local “cat lady” (also called a “hoarder“), or in the custody of some other unscrupulous person. Some don’t even make it out of the animal shelter’s parking lot.
In June 2005, for example, a Pennsylvania man who tried to surrender his dog to a no-kill shelter was told that he would have to make an appointment to return two weeks later when the facility might have room. The man grabbed his dog, got in his pickup truck, and left. At the next intersection, he threw the dog out of the truck and ran over him, crushing the dog beneath his tires. Shelter workers, who wouldn’t help the dog before he died, collected the dog’s remains.
Animals who are accepted into no-kill shelters may be warehoused in cages for months, years, or the rest of their lives, becoming more withdrawn, depressed, or aggressive every day—further reducing their chances of adoption. Conditions at some no-kill shelters are criminal.
PETA’s undercover investigation at a North Carolina no-kill shelter called All Creatures Great and Small documented that animals were suffering physically and emotionally as a result of ongoing, systematic abuse and neglect. In addition, the investigator observed that dogs, cats, and other animals were frequently left to languish in constant confinement, deprived of veterinary care, and subjected to a multitude of other atrocities.
No shelter that truly cares for animals should ever turn its back on an animal in need, even when that means taking in animals who are diseased, badly injured, aggressive, or elderly. These animals have little to no chance of being adopted or helped by anyone else, but a responsible animal shelter should at least provide them with a painless release from a world that does not want them.
You can help stop the overpopulation crisis that leads to extremely crowded animal shelters. Sign PETA’s pledge to end animal homelessness, always have your animal companions spayed or neutered, and never buy an animal from a breeder or pet shop.
Please do not allow your companion animal to be needlessly euthanized during times of crises. Take the appropriate steps now to ensure that he or she is well taken care of even after your divorce or death.
Hoarding
peta.org
Animal hoarders exist in virtually every community. Once described as “collectors” and thought of as well-intentioned people who were overwhelmed by the animal overpopulation crisis, animal hoarders are now recognized as individuals whose mental illness or compulsion can cause criminal behavior with horrific consequences for animals, the hoarders’ families, and their communities.
There are three characteristics of hoarding behavior agreed upon by experts and seen in nearly every case of hoarding:
Hoarders amass a large number of animals.
Hoarders fail to provide for animals’ most basic physical and social needs, including food, water, shelter, veterinary care, and sanitary living conditions.
Hoarders offer excuses for, or deny, the abysmal living conditions of their animals and, in some cases, their children.
An animal hoarder’s behavior translates into filthy, cramped, extremely crowded conditions for many animals, who are deprived—for years, in many cases—of basic needs such as sustenance, shelter, socialization, and veterinary care for their illnesses and injuries.
Hoarders often confine animals to tiny cages or crates that are stacked on top of each other, usually ignoring the animals’ social needs and need for exercise completely. Accumulated feces and urine—often covering every surface in hoarders’ residences—can create dangerously high ammonia levels, which can burn skin, eyes, and lungs.
Flea, mite, and worm infestations and outbreaks of contagious illnesses, including upper respiratory infections, mange, and parvovirus, spread quickly in these crowded conditions. Food and water are usually inadequate—if they are provided at all—leaving animals to suffer from malnourishment and dehydration. In some cases, animals have been found cannibalizing the remains of other animals who died of starvation or dehydration.
These crimes are almost always fatal for the animals. If they do not die at the scene, most are made so ill or “unadoptable”—having gone mad from confinement and deprivation or minimal care—that the most humane option for them is euthanasia. Many animals who go undiscovered by authorities languish for months or years on hoarders’ properties, dying slowly and agonizingly—a fate far worse than euthanasia administered by caring animal shelter workers.
Experts on hoarding behavior believe that dementia, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and other mental health problems may play a role in hoarders’ behavior. Animal hoarding is often misunderstood, and law enforcement agencies, prosecutors, and judges frequently mishandle cases—or ignore them—leaving animals in nightmarish situations. The consequences for hoarders, their human dependents, animals, and the community can be devastating.
Proper intervention is essential to prevent a relapse of hoarders’ behavior. According to Dr. Gail Steketee, a professor at Boston University’s School of Social Work, the relapse rate for animal hoarders is near 100 percent.
An effective, lasting intervention must include a ban on contact with animals for as long as a state’s laws allow; regular, unannounced home inspections by law enforcement or humane agents; psychiatric counseling; and sometimes a period of incarceration.
In a new 12-page report, “Animal Hoarders: Behavior, Consequences, and Appropriate Official Response,” PETA provides the fullest understanding of this behavior to date. Aimed at the public and officials at all levels, the report is intended to help craft and promote the necessary interventions in hoarding cases. Please make frequent use of this original, landmark literature. None of the text is copyrighted, and you are encouraged to use it in any way that you wish, including in letters to the editor of your local newspaper following stories about hoarders and in correspondence with local officials.
Animal Hoarders: The Illness and The Crime
peta.org
Animal hoarders—once described as “collectors” whose good intentions had gone awry—are now recognized as individuals whose mental illness or compulsion can cause criminal behavior with horrific consequences for animals, the hoarders’ families, and their communities.
The Animal Hoarder: A Profile
According to Dr. Gary J. Patronek, V.M.D., Ph.D., “[H]oarders are by definition oblivious to the extreme suffering, obvious to the causal observer, of their animals.”(1)
There are three characteristics indicative of hoarding behavior:
Hoarders amass a large number of animals.
Hoarders fail to provide for animals’ most basic physical and social needs, including food, water, shelter, veterinary care, and sanitary living conditions.
Hoarders offer excuses for, or deny, the abysmal living conditions of their animals and, in some cases, their children.(2)
According to the Vermont Animal Cruelty Task Force, hoarders also “find the thought of death so abhorrent that they deem an inhumane life far preferable to a humane death.”(3) This aspect of hoarding behavior is common among so-called “no-kill” shelters, where animals are often warehoused for years in deplorable conditions rather than provided with a peaceful and painless death by qualified technicians.
It is especially in these settings, as Dr. Ronald Ulfohn, D.V.M., states, where the purported “savior … becomes the oppressor.”(4) For example, Gloria Sutter pleaded guilty to eight counts of cruelty to animals after investigators reportedly found 198 ill cats and dogs at her Vanovia Animal Sanctuary in 2004.(5) Sutter had a history of amassing large numbers of animals: In 1984, more than 500 animals were found in poor health at the filthy facility, and in 1986, nearly 800 animals were discovered in similar conditions.(6)
The companion animal overpopulation crisis enables hoarders to operate everywhere. One 1999 study found that just over half of the hoarders operated in urban areas, with the remainder divided rather evenly between rural and suburban settings.(7)
While animals kept as companions—such as cats and dogs—are involved in as many as 65 percent of hoarding cases, farmed animals—including horses, goats, and pigs—are accumulated by more than 10 percent of hoarders.(8) The remains of nearly 100 cows, horses, goats, and pigs were reportedly found on the California ranch of Paul Keller in 2004.(9) Exotic animals and wildlife are also regularly rescued from hoarders. For example, authorities reportedly found 32 exotic animals of 11 species crammed into Angela Ancampora’s West Virginia mobile home.(10)
A Fate Worse than Death
Every hoarder’s behavior translates into severe, even fatal, neglect for animals in their custody. Overcrowded and filthy conditions make for easy transmission of worms, fleas, mange, ear mites, upper respiratory infections, parvo, distemper, and other diseases and can lead to feces-matted coats and urine burns. Hoarded animals are commonly deprived of basic veterinary care, including spaying and neutering, which causes the numbers of animals to increase, and/or results in the separation of animals by sex and their confinement to small cages or bathrooms. Injuries—including broken limbs and wounds suffered in fights with other animals—go untreated and lead to infections. According to news sources, most of the 61 cats found in a Michigan woman’s truck were suffering from everything from skin parasites to respiratory problems, and the majority of them had to be euthanized.(11) A 1999 study conducted by Dr. Patronek found that animals were reportedly found dead or suffering from “obvious disease or injury” in 80 percent of hoarding cases reviewed.(12)
Animals’ social needs are equally ignored by hoarders. Dogs, who are pack animals and crave companionship, are often kept chained or in pens for years, and they often develop anti-social behaviors and become highly fearful or aggressive. Cats deprived of human contact become skittish and—if allowed to reproduce—produce feral offspring.
The behavioral problems caused by physical and psychological neglect virtually eliminate animals’ chances of being rehabilitated and adopted. For many, euthanasia is the most humane option.
The Threat to Human Lives
Though the jeopardy that hoarders place animals is clear, The Hoarding of Animals Research Consortium states, “Animal hoarding has serious consequences for the physical and mental health of hoarders and their families,” as well as their neighbors.(13)
As mental-health experts have learned more about hoarding, they have proposed at least three behavioral models to explain the phenomenon:
Hoarders as “animal addicts: Houston veterinarian Dr. Karen Kemper believes that hoarders are “like alcoholics” and points to 10 behavioral traits that animal hoarders share with substance abusers, including recidivism, “denial that the addiction exists,” and “neglect of personal, physical, and environmental conditions.”(14,15)
Hoarders as suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) or obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (OCPD): The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) characterizes the hoarding of inanimate objects as a symptom of both OCD and OCPD.(16) One study found that more than 77 percent of hoarders’ premises were described as “heavily cluttered” and that an “extensive accumulation” of non-animal-related objects—such as newspapers—was present in nearly 75 percent of the cases.(17)
Hoarders as suffering from dementia: The Hoarding of Animals Research Consortium believes that dementia is among “the spectrum of psychological disorders” that hoarders may suffer from.(18)
The close quarters common in hoarding situations may facilitate the transmission of diseases from animals to humans, such as toxoplasmosis, psittacosis, and salmonellosis. These diseases also threaten a hoarder’s human dependents, especially children and the elderly, who were present in more than half of hoarding cases surveyed in one recent study.(19) For example, six children reportedly were removed from a filthy Virginia home that they were sharing with their parents and at least 16 cats and dogs in 2004.(20) High levels of ammonia may also be present in hoarder’s homes resulting from accumulated animal urine.
Because of these potential health hazards, some cities—including New York City and Seattle—have created interagency task forces that allow for adult and child protective services, animal control authorities, and health departments to work cooperatively on solutions in hoarding cases.(21)
Repeat Offenders
According to Dr. Gail Steketee, a professor at Boston University’s School of Social Work, the relapse rate for animal hoarders is near 100 percent.(22) An inadequate sentence for convicted animal hoarders—or one that is not enforced via regular official visits to ensure compliance—virtually guarantees a hoarder’s return to his or her ways, along with the disastrous consequences for humans and animals alike. “The old adage,” says Dr. Patronek, is that hoarders “have another cat by the time they’re home from the courthouse.”(23) Patronek found that nearly 60 percent of animal hoarding cases that he reviewed involved recidivism.(24)
What You Can Do
Contact humane officials and the police if you suspect animals are being neglected or abused by their caretakers—even those who appear well intentioned. Neighbors’ complaints often cite the unsanitary conditions, odors, noise (e.g., barking), and rodent and insect “infestations” commonly associated with animal hoarding situations. At least 57 percent of animal-hoarding cases are brought to authorities’ attention by a hoarder’s neighbors.(25)
Investigate before you turn an animal over to any shelter, humane group, or “rescuer.” Tour the facility yourself and accept no excuses for not being allowed to view the animals’ living quarters. Ask questions about animal care and adoption rates and policies.
Write to officials and the media when hoarding cases are publicized and urge that hoarders be barred from all contact with animals and ordered to undergo psychiatric evaluations and appropriate counseling or treatment. In 2001, Illinois became the first state to define and address animal hoarding in its anti-cruelty statute.(26) The law requires convicted animal hoarders to undergo a mental evaluation and appropriate treatment.(27)
Preventing hoarding and all other forms of cruelty to companion animals begins with fighting the overpopulation crisis. Ensure that your animals—and those of family, friends, and neighbors—are spayed or neutered.
Resources
1) Gary J. Patronek, V.M.D., Ph.D., “The Problem of Animal Hoarding,” Municipal Lawyer, May/Jun. 2001.
2) The Hoarding of Animals Research Consortium, 2004.
3) Vermont Animal Cruelty Task Force.
4) Ronald Ulfohn, D.V.M., “Animal Hoarders,” Paw Prints, Feb. 2000.
5) Todd C. Frankel, “Woman Pleads Guilty to Animal-Neglect Charges,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 21 Oct. 2004.
6) Todd C. Frankel, “Raid Nets 54 Animals at Union Apartment,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 10 Aug. 2004.
7) Gary J. Patronek, V.M.D., Ph.D., “Hoarding of Animals: An Under-Recognized Public Health Problem in a Difficult-to-Study Population,” Public Health Reports 114 (1999): 81-86.
8) Patronek, Public Health Reports.
9) Jim Schultz, “3 Charged in Animal Deaths. Tehama DA Says 100 Livestock Are Found on Property,” Record Searchlight, 10 Jul. 2004.
10) “Woman Accused of Neglecting Dozens of Animals Turns Herself in,” The Herald-Mail, 21 Sep., 2004.
11) “Majority of Cats Found in Back of Truck Destroyed,” Associated Press, 26 Jan. 2005.
12) Patronek, Public Health Reports.
13) The Hoarding of Animals Research Consortium, 2004.
14) Evan Moore, “Addicted to Animals/Self-Deception, Denial and Alibis for Their Behavior Suggest Some People Are Driven to Collect Too Many Animals,” Houston Chronicle, 21 Jul. 1991.
15) Evan Moore, “Ten Behavioral Traits of Animal Addicts,” Houston Chronicle, 21 Jul. 1991.
16) The Hoarding of Animals Research Consortium, 2004.
17) Patronek, Public Health Reports.
18) Bonnie L. Cook, “Helping ‘Animal Hoarders’ and Their Pets Is No Simple Task,” Knight Ridder Newspapers, 23 Sep. 2004.
19) Hoarding of Animals Research Consortium, “Health Implications of Animal Hoarding,” Health & Social Work, 27 (2002):
125-136.
20) Matthew Roy, “Burglary Report Leads to Child Neglect Charges,” The Virginian-Pilot, 19 Nov. 2004.
21) Nina Bernstein, “So Much Clutter, So Little Room: Examining the Roots of Hoarding,” The New York Times, 4 Jan. 2004.
22) Cook.
23) Jamie Malernee, “Woman May Be Animal Hoarder,” St. Petersburg Times, 2 Jul 2001.
24) Patronek, Public Health Reports.
25) Patronek, Public Health Reports.
26) American Veterinary Medical Association, “Lawmakers Tackle Animal Hoarding. States Look to New Laws to Address Animal Hoarders,” JAVMA News, 1 May 2003.
27) Public Act 92-0454, State of Illinois, 92nd General Assembly, 21 Aug. 2001.
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