Animal Shelter Numbers Tell Only a Part of the Story

Source: Huffington Post

 

 The problem of homelessness in America is cause for alarm -- and for action. Most of us are aware of the distressing reality of homelessness faced every day by millions of our fellow citizens -- war veterans, the mentally ill, children, families, the working poor. Far fewer are aware of another homeless population among us. Even the size of this neglected population is difficult to determine and it is entirely unable to advocate for itself.  The number of homeless dogs and cats in the U.S. cannot be established by merely tallying up the numbers at all the animal shelters. The fact is, many, perhaps most, surplus pets never enter the shelter system. Yet their lives may be at greater risk than those that do enter shelters. If we are to address the problem of homelessness among our country's dog and cat population, and reduce the horrors that face this population (neglect, roadside abandonment, intentional cruelty, euthanasia), we must include the uncounted, the "invisible," among them in the discussion.

In considering the issue of homeless pets, some may argue that if all pets were simply obtained from animal shelters, the number of homeless companion animals would gradually be reduced to the point that the euthanasia of healthy, loving dogs and cats would largely cease. However, that would not work because the math just doesn't add up.

According to the Spay USA website, 70,000 pets are born in the U.S. each day, while according to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, only 10,957.2 people are born each day (or 3,999,386 annually). So unless families pick up their seven dogs or cats each time there is an addition to the family, the number of surplus pets will continue to exceed the number of homes available to them.
By focusing our efforts on adoption instead of reducing births we may cycle different, but not fewer, pets through the shelter system. Only by reducing the number of unintended births among our dog and cat population can we hope to reduce euthanasia, neglect and cruelty.

According to the American Pet Products Association (APPA) the world's leading pet products and manufacturers trade association, the largest source of household pets is not the local animal shelter, a breeder, or a pet store. A 2012 APPA poll revealed that while 21 percent of dogs are obtained from shelters and 26 percent from breeders, 39 percent are from the combined random sources of friend, family member or stray -- sources that typically reflect impulse decisions, not planned adoptions. The number of cats obtained from a friend, family member or stray is reported to be 75 percent. And for both dogs and cats, the number obtained as a stray is greater than the number coming from pet stores. These figures represent the cycles of pets in poverty; pets obtained from these sources are at risk of producing even more unintended litters that are also likely to join the ranks of the invisible homeless.

An April, 2009, a Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (JAVMA) article revealed that household income is the greatest predictor of whether or not pets undergo a spay/neuter operation, with homes earning under $35,000 being almost half as likely to have pets altered than homes over $75,000. Ultimately, most unwanted litters originate in low-income communities and the pets are likely to be passed on to their new homes unaltered and with the mothers remaining at risk of producing more litters. Those concerned with shelter euthanasias and animal neglect should be alarmed that the animals most likely to suffer are the unplanned puppies and kittens that are passed between family members, friends and neighbors, or given away in parking lots or through newspaper ads and websites like Craigslist. According to Pet-Abuse.com, a national database on animal cruelty, dogs are the number-one animal victim targeted for cruelty. Pet-Abuse.com also notes that "free-to-good home" advertisements, a common method for placing unplanned litters in communities without shelters, increase the risk of an animal becoming a victim. Intact male dogs are victims in 80 percent of canine cruelty cases, followed by puppies.

Even if we were to count only the animals that enter the shelter system, the number of homeless is startling: According to Oxford Pets, roughly eight million surplus animals will enter shelters in the U.S. this year. Some will enter as part of a litter and others will enter as adults. Only 25 percent of the dogs and a very small percentage of cats will be purebred; 75 percent of dogs and nearly all of the cats will be mixed breed animals that originated in unplanned and largely unwanted litters. Most will originate in low-income communities and fewer than half will leave the shelters alive.

Although we may be drawn to complex socio-economic explanations to account for and address the problem of homelessness in people, in the case of homeless pets we need to begin with the simple fact that there are just too many dogs and cats for the number of homes available for them and that being part of this surplus leaves millions of dogs and cats out in the cold. Although affordable spay/neuter services exist in many urban areas of our nation, throughout vast areas of the U.S., spay/neuter services remain spotty and unavailable. Literally millions of surplus animals are born as a result of that void. Without increasing convenient access to spay/neuter programs and mandating their use, effecting change in many areas of the nation could still take decades.

With ad campaigns and other encouragements, we can, perhaps, increase the number of cats and dogs entering and leaving through the revolving door of our local animal shelters, but spay/neuter programs, not adoption, prevent the overwhelming number of excess pets from needing homes, entering shelters or becoming victims, no matter where on the timeline they are counted.

Nancy Atwater, executive director of Tulsa-based Spay Oklahoma, a high volume spay/neuter program founded in 2004 that currently provides over 12,000 spays or neuters to pets in low-income Tulsa City/County homes each year, says that much of this is a matter of common sense. According to Atwater, "The shelters in most large cities are diligent about spaying or neutering pets before release. So if most pets came from either shelters or breeders, urban spay/neuter programs would serve largely purebred dogs and cats. But that's not what happens. Our clients mainly have mixed-breed animals that were obtained locally. And we see almost as many of these as the number of surplus pets that enter the local shelter every year."
The number of pets entering shelters may be equaled by the number of surplus pets that are never counted. Our vision, and our solution, needs to encompass all that are at risk of hunger, cruelty and neglect.

Shifting our current practice from the collection and dispersal of homeless animals to preventing their births can stop the suffering and abate the need for building or expanding shelters. It can be done. It just means changing our strategy to spay/neuter, something that is cheaper, easier and more humane than building shelters to lock up unwanted pets. This should not take decades.

The Truth About Cats: They're Good for Us

Source: DISCOVERY

THE GIST

- Cats have gotten a bad health rap, as new research suggests they may be beneficial to human health.
- Cats could even help to lower human risk of cancer.
- Cats may harbor T. gondii, but feline ownership does not predict risk of infection with this parasite.

News headlines over the past few years have linked cat ownership to everything from cancer to craziness, but new studies suggest that cats are actually beneficial to human health, and may even reduce our risk for cancer and other diseases. Reports in this week's issue of Biology Letters, for example, counter the tabloid-suggested link between cats and human brain cancer. Marion Vittecoq of the Tour du Valat research center and her colleagues conclude that cats should not be blamed for human cancer. In fact, studies show just the opposite. Vittecoq told Discovery News that "according to our knowledge, studies that have focused on the link between cancer and cat ownership so far have found either no association at all or a reduced risk of cancer in cat owners."

As an example, she and co-author Frédéric Thomas cite a National Institutes of Health Study by G.J. Tranah and colleagues. It found dog and cat owners have a reduced risk of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. The longer the duration of pet ownership was, the less chance the individual would suffer from this type of cancer.
Why cats and dogs may benefit human health remains a mystery, but another study from earlier this month provides some intriguing clues. It found that infants having pets at home suffered from fewer respiratory tract illnesses. "Our findings support the theory that during the first year of life, animal contacts are important, possibly leading to better resistance to infectious respiratory illnesses during childhood," wrote Eija Bergroth and colleagues in the paper, published in the journal Pediatrics.

Countless other studies demonstrate the mental health benefits of pet ownership, particularly for students, seniors and people with chronic illnesses. In such cases, pets can provide much needed comfort and companionship.

Cats have gotten a bad rap over the years, however, for a few different reasons. One is based on old ridiculous superstitions, such as how black cats are bad luck. The other, however, centers on a scientific debate concerning cancer and the protozoan parasite Toxoplasma gondii. In earlier research, Vittecoq and Thomas determined that there is a positive correlation between this parasite and incidence of brain cancer. Cats can host this bug, and therein lies the "felines are bad for you" media frenzy over the past several months. But the authors themselves indicate that cats have been mistakenly maligned, due to the other studies supporting the health benefits of cats, the fact that the connection between the parasite and cancer has still not been firmly established.

Thomas explained that "humans usually get infected through the consumption of undercooked meat, especially sheep, containing asexual stages of T. gondii" or through contact with contaminated soil (which good hygiene remedies). Other studies show that ingestion of the bug in contaminated water, fruit, vegetables, and raw goat milk can lead to infection. The parasite is therefore somewhat similar to E. coli, in terms of transmission routes.

Victoria Benson of Oxford University's Cancer Epidemiology Unit, and her team also have a statement in the latest Biology Letters addressing this matter. Benson and her team are conducting what's called the "Million Women Study," which investigates a tremendous amount of data concerning middle-aged women from the U.K. The scientists found zero association with incidence of brain cancer and women living with a cat.
"This, however, does not rule out the possibility that T. gondii infection from another source may be associated with brain cancer incidence," Benson and her team write. If that other source, which may even be another parasite, is found, Thomas says it could "provide a means to reduce the risk of brain cancer, particularly in countries like France where the incidence of brain cancer and T. gondii are both high."

Can This Cat Predict Death?

Source: DISCOVERY

If you're a patient at Rhode Island's Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, there's one visitor you don't want stopping by your bed: a white and tortoiseshell cat named Oscar. Not because Oscar isn't friendly — by all accounts he is — but because according to a doctor who works there, David Dosa, Oscar has the mysterious power to predict who's going to die.

He is said to wander the building, stopping to see patients who only have a short time to live — in some cases surprising the staff with the predictions. The cat is credited with correctly predicting at least 50 deaths at the nursing home over the past five years. Oscar first rose to prominence in 2007 when Dosa wrote a piece in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine about the cat, and later in a popular 2010 book titled "Making the Rounds with Oscar: The Extraordinary Gift of an Ordinary Cat." What might explain Oscar's strange powers?

There are a few things to note about the story. First, though Dosa's piece about Oscar in The New England Journal of Medicine is sometimes described as a "study," it was nothing of the sort. No scientific experiments or medical research was conducted on the feline's alleged death-detecting abilities; the piece was instead a personal essay.  There's nothing wrong with essays, but they are essentially stories and anecdotes, which don't necessarily carry any scientific or evidential weight.

In an analysis of Dosa's book about Oscar published in Skeptical Inquirer magazine, researcher Joe Nickell found a troubling lack of scientific rigor surrounding the cat's surprising abilities: [Dosa's] evidence is the kind disparaged in science as anecdotal. That is, it is based on personal narratives that may be affected by mistaken perceptions, faulty memory, folkloric influences, and many other faults…. Biased selection is a very real problem: there is a natural tendency for believers in some phenomenon to collect stories supporting it, just as there is for disbelievers to collect stories discrediting it. And because Dosa admits to making up some events and creating fictional characters in his book, Nickell concludes "there is no point in trying to evaluate the anecdotal evidence: it has been manipulated — in the interest of telling a good story, of course — so it is scientifically worthless."

So there's some question about how reliable the data behind Oscar's legend really is: Was Oscar there at the moment of death, or within a few minutes, or a few hours? Was he there for all deaths, or just some of them? Did he meow at the bedside alerting nurses, or did he just wander by the room at some point earlier?
We have no hard data on these questions. But assuming that Oscar really does visit imminently terminal patients more often than others, there may be scientific explanations.

It's possible that Oscar may simply be responding to nurses and staff activity related to the patient's condition. For example, patients who are near death are likely to have more activity in their rooms (for the obvious reason that nurses pay extra attention to those in danger of dying than they do to medically stable patients). Oscar may visit those beds more often simply because there’s more going on there, or the patients seem especially unwell.

It's well known that animals often sense and react to subtle cues around them. This was demonstrated in the famous case of Clever Hans, a horse said to have amazing abilities including reading, writing, and doing math calculations in the 1800s.  Hans baffled huge crowds until finally two psychologists discovered that the horse was responding to unconscious cues from his trainer — even movements as subtle as a smile or a lean forward. The Clever Hans story and its discovery of unconscious cueing is still discussed among psychologists and animal communication experts. In fact, a study last year found that dogs follow cues from their owners' facial expressions.

In some cases the cat was physically brought to the bedsides of people who were known to be dying. This is understandable, since pets can comfort the dying, but is hardly mysterious, and reflects the staff's — not Oscar's — medical knowledge about the patient's prognosis. It's also important to note that the floor Oscar wanders is not just any hospital wing, but the advanced dementia unit — a 41-bed unit where, as Dosa acknowledges, "passing of some residents was not unexpected due to their advanced condition."
If Oscar wanders by enough rooms for long enough, he will likely be in or near rooms with dying patients just by random chance every now and then. Still, Dosa and others insist, Oscar is uncannily accurate.
Could it be something else? There's interesting research suggesting that dogs can detect cancer and other diseases. The most likely explanation is not some psychic ability but instead that the dogs' super-sensitive noses can detect faint biochemical traces given off by the body's reaction to the disease.

While studies show that canine disease detection is better than chance, it is still not as accurate as formal medical tests in many cases. A 2004 British Medical Journal study found that dogs could detect bladder cancer in patients at a rate 25 percent better than chance, but at a lower rate than standard tests.
Dosa offers a similar mechanism as a potential explanation for Oscar's powers, though it's not clear what specific chemicals released just before death would trigger a reaction. In addition, there are countless confounding odors in a hospital setting that might mask any animal-detected "death scent," including flowers, food, cleaning sanitizers, drugs and perfumes.

The story of Oscar the death-detecting cat is an interesting, lighthearted story, but falls short of being scientifically unexplainable. However that interpretation is more comforting than another explanation: that the lovable Oscar is really a feline serial killer, bringing death wherever he goes.