For this year's World Animal Day on October 4, the German Animal Welfare Federation, together with its more than 740 member associations, is proclaiming the motto “Animal shelters at the limit”. Animal shelters are in great danger due to overcrowding caused by “corona animals” and the enormous increase in cost pressure. The German Animal Welfare Federation is calling on politicians and society to stand up together for animal shelters and save charitable animal welfare in Germany.
“Politicians, administrators and the public often take it for granted that animal shelters are places to go for animals and pet owners in need. However, in view of the precarious situation in many places, this can hardly be guaranteed. The political ignorance of recent years towards practical animal welfare has dramatically exacerbated the situation. The federal, state and local authorities must work together to help,” Thomas Schröder, President of the German Animal Welfare Federation, makes clear. “The financial burden due to rising veterinary costs with the new fee schedule, the minimum wage and inflation with dramatically rising energy costs in particular is increasing massively. Added to this are the many “corona animals”, which require intensive care, especially for dogs. It can also be assumed that there will be a slump in donations due to the general situation. It is to be feared that many animal shelters will not survive the winter. We need a rescue package!”
The nationwide network of animal welfare associations with animal shelters and similar facilities fills the state objective of animal welfare set out in the German constitution with life. Although they provide services on behalf of the public sector, such as the care of found animals or confiscated animals, politicians have let them down for decades - financially, but also through failures at the regulatory level. In the view of the German Animal Welfare Association, pets should have been better protected long ago and the burden on animal shelters should have been reduced: with clear rules for breeding, keeping and trading, a ban on online trading in animals and a mandatory certificate of competence for pet owners. So many animals are now arriving at animal shelters that more and more admission stops have to be imposed. Many dogs in particular require intensive care, for example because they were illegally smuggled into Germany as puppies from breeds that violate animal welfare laws - increasingly in times of coronavirus - or because their previous owners were completely inexperienced and overwhelmed in dealing with dogs.
ABOUT WORLD ANIMAL WELFARE DAY
World Animal Day goes back to Saint Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals, who was canonized on 4 October 1228. Every year, animal rights activists use the day to draw attention to the suffering of animals caused by humans.
