India’s stray dogs blocked by US adoption ban

By Anagha Subhash Nair, CNN

When Jill Trail first met Pihu, a frail 6 week old puppy, in India, she knew she needed his care. Living on the streets, Pihu had suffered spinal injuries and infections so severe that both hind legs had to be amputated.

There was a problem: Trail lived in the United States.

She decided it didn’t matter. So, last year, she worked with non-governmental organizations to bring the puppy to the United States and eventually adopted her. Today Pihu is a healthy, wheelchair-bound puppy with a loving home.

“People tell me all the time, ‘God bless you for taking a dog like this,’” says Trail. “But I am the luckiest. There is no sacrifice on my part. Pihu is so inspiring and full of personality.

But as of July 14 of this year, similar rescue stories are no longer possible. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has temporarily, indefinitely suspended the importation of dogs from more than 100 countries, including India.

The CDC says the ban is necessary to reduce the risk of rabies following a series of forged rabies vaccination certificates. But the move is a problem for charities across India like Kannan Animal Welfare (KAW), which often helps find overseas homes for stray dogs from India, including Pihu.

It can be difficult to find a suitable home for stray dogs in India. Many are physically and mentally disabled after suffering trauma and abuse and need a caregiver committed to their rehabilitation.

KAW founder Vandana Anchalia says that in India stray dogs are seen as dirty, unattractive and difficult to train – and most Indians prefer to adopt pedigrees.

NGOs fear the restrictions will mean fewer dogs are moving to safety – and that many more are languishing on the streets of India.

Sending dogs abroad

Anchalia founded KAW in 2015 after learning more about the cruelties facing the roughly 60 million street dogs in India.

KAW was started out as a rehabilitation center for stray dogs that were offered for local adoption after treatment. Soon Anchalia and her team discovered that these dogs, many of whom were physically disfigured or disabled, had a better chance of finding homes abroad.

Over the past six years, KAW has sent approximately 115 rescued street dogs to the United States, in partnership with The American NGOs Operation Paws for Homes and Twenty Paws Rescue. These US-based organizations determine which dogs are best suited, and then KAW sends the dogs by freight or on a volunteer basis to shelters, where they are adopted.

“We have to (send dogs overseas) to maintain a (lower) number at the shelter… if we don’t… we can’t admit new dogs. We cannot overcrowd our shelter, ”says Anchalia.

Peedu’s People, an NGO registered in Texas and Punjab, has sent nearly 90 dogs with special needs to the United States over the past five years. Most dogs are included in its “street reception” program where dogs are vaccinated, sterilized and supervised by a resident who feeds them.

When the dogs are too badly injured to survive independently on the streets, Peedu’s People tries to repatriate them overseas, which they cannot do under new CDC rules.

The organization already has a “backlog of puppies who have to go abroad because they have no chance of surviving on the roads in India,” says founder Inder Sandhu.

Deb Jarrett, founder of Dharamsala Animal Rescue (DAR), based in India Himachal Pradesh State, says it costs around $ 3,000 to send a dog to the United States for adoption, paid for by the charity or the adopter.

Sandhu says ubiquity of these street dogs had desensitized many Indians to their plight.

“It’s easy for people in the United States to find a dog, but they connect with the story of an Indian dog,” he says. “It’s not that Indians aren’t compassionate, it’s just that we’ve seen so many of them that there’s an apathy we have towards these animals.”

The difficulty of adopting a street dog

Life on the streets carries health risks – and that is exactly what worries US officials.

Abi T. Vanak, an ecologist at Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), based in India, says that in addition to human-related hazards, such as being hit by a car or being hit by a car or If mistreated, these dogs are at risk of contracting many diseases, including distemper, worms, mange and mange.

Dave Daigle, Associate Director of Communications at The CDC’s Center for Global Health says the temporary ban is due to a 50% increase in the number of dogs refused entry to the United States in 2020, compared to previous years. A significant number of these entry denials involved dogs with forged rabies vaccination certificates, which “puts the United States at risk of importing a dog that is not sufficiently protected against rabies.”

This comes with a huge potential price tag for the United States. Daigle estimates that for every rabid dog imported, it could cost more than half a million US dollars to contain the spread of canine rabies in the public.

Rabies is spread through dog bites and causes inflammation of the brain and spinal cord. The disease kills around 20,000 people in India every year, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), accounting for 36% of all rabies deaths worldwide.

WHO says a number of rabies cases go unreported, so the numbers could be higher.

Jarrett of DAR says disinformation about rabies, especially in rural India, makes it difficult to contain disease. She has encountered a plethora of “remedies” for dog bites, ranging from “applying turmeric and chili on the bite to consuming holy water to some good deeds.”

Under the new rules, some dogs are allowed in the United States, but not for adoption or transfer of ownership. Homeowners must apply for a permit, and individuals can only three dogs at a time. Dogs must be microchipped and tested for rabies at least 30 days after being vaccinated against rabies and 90 days before arriving in the United States.

What is India doing at home?

With a temporary ban on sending dogs to India, solving the problem of street dogs in the country must be done at home.

After two people sought police protection for feeding stray dogs because they were threatened by other locals to do so, the Delhi High Court ruled on July 1 that street dogs have the right to ‘to be fed – and that citizens have the right to feed them.

Some animal lovers welcomed the decision, as it would prevent the dogs from starving to death. Others have expressed concern that feeding these dogs might encourage them to congregate at food sources, where they might become territorial and aggressive.

Anchalia believes that while the High Court ruling is a step in the right direction, it is also important that citizens take responsibility for the dogs they feed.

“People may feel good about feeding a lot of dogs, but if the dog population grows and the puppies die on the streets, that’s not a solution,” she says. “The way to help is to feed the dog, to vaccinate him and to sterilize him. “

The Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI), established by the Indian government as an advisory body, has undertaken Animal Birth Control (ABC) programs to sterilize street dogs, as well as dog vaccination campaigns against rabies. There are no official statistics on the number of dogs that have been spayed under ABC, and the AWBI did not respond to requests for comment.

But Vanak says current programs don’t match on the scale of the stray dog ​​problem in India. He thinks a more permanent solution would be to redirect resources invested in ABC programs to expanding animal shelters for dogs.

“Dogs on the streets have very poor welfare outcomes. The welfare of animals, especially domestic animals, is best guaranteed under human supervision or under human care, ”he says.

Voice of Stray Dogs (VOSD) is an animal welfare organization that has rehabilitated over 8,000 stray dogs since its inauguration in 2013. Its gem is a dog sanctuary in Bangalore that is home to over 800 dogs.

“It might not make sense financially, but it does make sense to me, and it still makes sense to us (VOSD),” says Rakesh Shukla, founder of VOSD, of the reception of dogs suffering from serious physical injuries. “We have a clear policy of not saying no to any dog, and we will never refuse a dog and we will never drop a dog because we don’t have enough space or money.”

Vanak, however, thinks India needs less quick fixes and more systemic solutions.

“The dog problem requires a reimagining of our relationship with dogs,” he says. “You need better education so that people take good care of their dogs and see them as a precious part of the landscape. “

Before the start of Covid-19, DAR ran an education program in schools in Dharamsala, where children were taught to be kind to street dogs and to avoid conflict with them.

Anchalia believes the ban on the export of Indian dogs to the United States could be the boost needed to help change Indian attitudes and encourage local adoptions. She says the slow-paced life associated with the Covid-19 lockdown in India has opened people’s eyes to the rise in animal cruelty and the problems associated with stray dogs.

Anchalia believes this new awareness, coupled with moves to change the younger generation’s perception of roaming dogs, may offer some redemption to India’s neglected dogs.

“The greatest responsibility lies with us,” she said. “The solution is for us all to come together and work for these dogs.”

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