Category Archives: Euthanasia

Luna didn't have a permanent home, and the lovable pup's situation was growing dire, as the local social services department was beginning to threaten euthanasia if she couldnt find somewhere to live. She needed a loving caretaker, and soon.

Luckily, Lucie Holmes was on the way.

When social services contacted Lucie about Lunas situation, she immediately knew what she had to do. Lucie, who runs Lucies Animal Rescue in North Yorkshire, England, was confused when she noticed that Luna, an excitable 12-month-old German shepherd, seemed to be exhibiting signs of pregnancy.

Lucie took Luna to the vet, where a scan soon proved what she had suspected. Not only was Luna pregnant, but her puppies were due any day.

I think I had a panic attack, Lucie told The Dodo. I had nothing for puppies.

Lucie quickly prepared her home for the puppies arrival and made sure Luna had everything she needed to stay healthy through the end of her pregnancy.

Two weeks later, the puppies arrived. When Luna finally went into labor, Lucie and her family were shocked at how many babies shed been carrying.

We were expecting four, possibly five puppies, Lucie said. [We] could not believe it when she delivered 10! I stayed up with her all night, and she was amazing.

Though Luna is young, shes already proven to be such a good mom. She has no problem making sure all of her puppies have enough to eat, and still maintains a joyful spirit.

Once Lunas babies are old enough, all of them will be up for adoption through Lucies Animal Rescue. Luna will be looking for her forever home, too.

Lucie has great admiration for Luna, whos been through so much yet still manages to show such a unique love and kindness toward her caretakers and her new puppies.

Shes been incredible, Lucie said. Im so proud of her.

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Woman Rescues Dog From Euthanasia, Then Realizes She's Saving More Than One Life - The Dodo

Not only have we seen the passing of a universally admired and much-loved woman who, as Queen Elizabeth, dedicated her life to the service of her people. We are also witnessing the decline of reasoning, even rationality, and the self-evident truth of issues upon which these depend. In fact, the shadows are not just over my homeland of New Zealand but over other Western democracies including Canada, where, shockingly enough, the sixth-leading cause of death is euthanasia.

New Zealands own strongly pro-death ACT party leader David Seymour, who, like Jacinda Ardern, voted that aborted babies born alive should be denied medical help or care, assured New Zealanders that introducing assisted death into this country would not be the beginning of a slippery slope downwards. Really?

Unfortunate enough to be dominated by one of Western democracies most tyrannical and obnoxious prime ministers, Canadians have found the eligibility criteria for choosing assisted death inevitably broadened. Any adult with a serious disease or a mental health condition can now choose euthanasia, with policies being prepared for further liberalisation. More than 10,000 Canadians chose to be put to death in the most recent year for which data is available, with some choosing death because of mounting medical debts. Two instances are cited: one of an individual opting for euthanasia because he couldnt keep up with the high costs of living at home with caregivers. The other was after a hospital staffer informed him it would cost $1,500 per day to keep him alive in hospital before then mentioning euthanasia.

A civilisation is in decline when its members are urged to commit suicide. An age of insanity has come upon us, with our hierarchies (too often now wrongly called elites) cynically supporting the politics of delusion, arguably even of madness, as when people refuse to accept certain realities. Such as when an individual is born indisputably biologically male, equipped with the body and physique to substantiate this, but claims to be female. Instead of being offered the mental and emotional support which he may well need to introduce him to the reality that he is provably not female, our hierarchies, especially throughout our degraded universities, have connived at this assault upon fact and reason. Even worse has been their support for our young being propagandised into believing they can choose to change their gender by physically and chemically undergoing what is basically an assault against the bodies of confused children.

Those who argue that this is an actual crime, even when misguidedly undertaken, have an excellent case. The howls of outrage, even of hatred, today directed against those on the side of sanity would not have been heard even one or two decades ago. Pointing out that biology determines whether an individual is a man or a woman, and that simply choosing to identify as transgender does not establish it as a truth, was not necessary. I myself identifying as a male would be nonsensical as silly as someone claiming to be a werewolf or to be invisible. That undoubted truths get dismissed because of their inconvenience has seen the dark creeping further out over the West.

Our democracies have become further assaulted by the battering ram of totalitarianism, as with Premier Dan Andrews employing the police as a brutal political weapon against peaceful protesters. And on this side of the Tasman, Jacinda Ardern faces mounting public pressure for a review into an explosive Interpol leak. Australian reporters Avi Yemini and Rukshan Fernando were inexplicably politically profiled by NZ Police, with Interpol Wellington seeking to stop them entering the country to report on an anti-government protest. Independent reporter Sean Plunket noted that someone in the New Zealand police made the decision to dig up dirt to stop them coming, with our typically evasive Prime Minister saying she could not verify the secret police memo. Plunket pointed out that if instructions were not given to the police by the government, this question needs to be asked: Do our police have the statutory right to decide whom they want or dont want in the country, based on their political or other views?

New Zealanders now have almost no say about what is happening in their country. Directives have been given to all government departments to now refer to this country as Aotearoa overwhelmingly rejected by 90 per cent of New Zealanders in an independent poll. Not for a moment does this faze Ardern, determinedly ignoring the wishes of the majority, not only with regard to her utterly undemocratic policies of co-governance i.e. regarding a minority of part-Maori descent, often markedly minimal, as legally entitled to not only share, but even control decision-making.

We are ahead, still, of Australia, where the parallel movement to provide special rights to those of aboriginal descent is now underway. Australians need to wake up faster than most well-meaning, but dozy New Zealanders, who good-naturedly did not object to Maori greetings such as Kia ora and Nga mihi taking precedence over English, and our national anthem being first sung in reconstituted Maori. But little by little we have got to the stage where our important institutions now have reinvented, Maori-only names, incomprehensible to most New Zealanders and telling us nothing about why they exist. Waka Kohati, for example, is meaningless, as is Kainga Ora. And when a sentence incomprehensibly states that a rahui has been put over some land, it is basically insulting to the majority including new migrants struggling to learn English, our most important national and international language, as well as to preserve their own.

As the so-called indigenous movement gains strength around the world which should be irrelevant to us here in New Zealand Maori are not indigenous, and can name the canoes in which they arrived its time for the majority to fight far more determinedly for the values for which our forebears gave their lives in two world wars. It is high time for both our peoples to wake up to the reality that we are facing the deliberate promotion of policies of disaffection, with the fanning of the fires of the grievance industry as part of communisms long war against the West. We are late to wake up to the poet Yeats warning, The good lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.

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Shadows over New Zealand - The Spectator Australia

Express News Service

KOCHI: At a time whenthe stray dog menace is on the rise in the state, the Kerala government on Tuesday approached the Supreme Court seeking to permit euthanasia or culling of violent and vicious stray dogs, in particular, dogs suspected of having contracted rabies.

The petition pointed out that "one issue is pertaining to the matter of rabid/feral dogs. While the State Act and Rules provide for destruction of dogs that are violent or rabid, no culling is undertaken currently as it is regarded as contrary to the Central Rules. When there is a zoonotic disease outbreak, the culling of animals or birds (for bird flu or swine flu) is undertaken to prevent the spread. However, in the case of rabid dogs, they are only to be isolated till they die."

The government stated that it had conducted detailed discussions regarding the control of stray dog bites and prevention of bite victims getting infected by rabies and also evaluated the progress of previous ministerial-level meetings.

Orders were issued to resolve the state of affairs by carrying out immediate action based on the decisions to solve the issues caused by stray dogs in the state by forming an immediate action plan at the local government level. The government also decided to identify hotspots where there has been an increased incidence of dog bites among animals and humans. Vaccination drives across all LSGS with saturation focus in the hotspots. Temporary shelters/cages to take ferocious dogs off the street with arrangements for feeding and care. It also decided to conduct a cleanliness drive to tackle wet waste particularly meat waste in public places or the wayside, which lead to the congregation of dogs for food.

Alternate arrangements through community-based committees at the LSG level to provide food for the dogs to be made, taking the support of dog lovers, hoteliers, kennel owners, etc. The state has also instructed escalation of pet dog registration (and vaccination) and LSG level committees of all local stakeholders are constituted to ensure the above. Action has also been initiated to scale up the ABC programme activities of the state within the existing restrictions.

Permit Kudumbashree to implement the ABC programme

The government also cited another issue which is the withdrawal of Kudumbashree Units from the ABC programme following the interim order by the High Court of Kerala, bringing the ABC programme to a complete halt in eightdistricts. The High Court had issued an order restraining the inclusion of Kudumbashree as an implementing agency for the Animal Birth Control Project which was being conducted to prevent the increase in the number of stray dogs.

The reason was the lack of certification by the Animal Welfare Board of India. This certification of AWBI had been denied on account of the gap in infrastructural facilities as per the terms and conditions of the guidelines. At present, the permission to conduct the ABC program shall only be given to the agencies which have the certification of Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI). Kudumbasree has taken the necessary steps to obtain that certification from AWBI some additional infrastructural requirements are to be met to satisfy the conditions stipulated. But the emergent situation warrants an immediate restoration of the ABC programme, and enhancement of its reach so that the problem of stray dogs can be permanently resolved. It is a fact that there are hardly any AWBI-certified organizations to undertake theactivities of the programme in Kerala.

Hence, the government sought to permit the Kudumbashree units trained in the ABC programme to undertake the Animal Birth Control programme to tide over the present crisis.

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Stray dog attacks: Kerala moves SC seeking to permit euthanasia or culling of rabies-infected dogs - The New Indian Express

The Bench is considering a plea to modify a March 2018 judgment which had upheld passive euthanasia and Living Will but gave the job of ascertaining the genuineness of the document to multiple committees

The Bench is considering a plea to modify a March 2018 judgment which had upheld passive euthanasia and Living Will but gave the job of ascertaining the genuineness of the document to multiple committees

The Constitution Bench on Thursday asked if a lone committee of doctors, judicial officers, and government officers along with the next of kin of a terminally-ill person can sit together and decide the genuineness and authenticity of a Living Will.

The Bench led by Justice K.M. Joseph is considering a plea to modify a March 2018 judgment which had upheld passive euthanasia and Living Will, but gave the job of ascertaining the genuineness of the document to multiple committees of doctors, Magistrates and the District Collector, virtually making the judgment itself redundant and unworkable.

One committee can be formed to take a decision. Suppose the patient is not able to take a decision at the time, his or her next of kin can do so. The government can keep a check too, Justice Ajay Rastogi said. Justice Aniruddha Bose said care should be taken to avoid any forced departures of persons. The court agreed to hear the case on November 23.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, for the Centre, was sceptical about trusting the next of kin of a dying person with the latters life. He said there were cases in which relatives refuse to put a patient on the ventilator but the person survives after having been done so.

Senior advocate Arvind Datar, for the petitioner, said the 2018 judgment had laid down a cumbersome procedure to check the veracity of a Living Will. The court had placed a huge onus on the treating hospital and physicians to take the initiative to form a committee and activate the Living Will or advance directive.

The 2018 judgment had agreed that failure to legally recognise an advance medical directive inconveniences the right to smoothen the dying process. In cases of terminally-ill or permanently vegetative state patients, where there is no hope for revival, priority should be given to the Living Wills and the right of self-determination.

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Petition on process to activate living will to be heard on November 23 - The Hindu

The three two-hour episodes of The U.S. and the Holocaust, a documentary by Ken Burns, Lynn Novick, and Sarah Botstein, debuted on PBS beginning Sept. 18.

Toward the end of The U.S. and the Holocaust, Ken Burns new documentary, the audience hears the last entry in the wartime diary of Anne Frank: Its a wonder I havent abandoned all my ideals, they seem so absurd and impractical. Yet I cling to them because I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart.

Moments later, the historian Deborah Lipstadt appears onscreen to declare that these words are not the story of the Holocaust. The American reaction to the German campaign to exterminate Europes Jews, the principle subject of the film, does not redound to our credit, she says.

Of all the films Burns has made, this is the timeliest and most disturbing. It tells two intertwined stories in graphic detail: Adolf Hitlers maniacal determination to murder the Jews of Europe and the forces that kept the United States from doing more to stop him. As the film notes in closing, the anti-Semitic rants and lies in the America of 1930s and 40s still echo in the nations political climate in 2022.

The Statue of Liberty graces the screen more than once during the film. Americans take such pride in this national symbol that 3.5 million of them visit it each year. Many identify with the lines of Emma Lazarus sonnet hailing the majestic statue as the Mother of Exiles:

Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, tempest-tost, to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

The Burns film clarified how short of these ideals America fell during the years before World War II. The Ku Klux Klan re-emerged as a murderous vigilante force in the 1920s. Much of the country supported euthanasia to strengthen the gene pool, racial segregation, the social ostracism of Jews, and the virulent anti-Semitism of Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh, among others. Hitler-loving German Bunds drew more than 20,000 people to a 1938 rally at Madison Square Garden.

Rolled out one after another in the film, these strains of hatred portray an America far removed from the country described in high school history books.

After Kristallnacht, the Nazi rampage of rape and terror that killed hundreds of Jews and destroyed 2,500 Jewish-owned businesses in Germany, survivors flocked to U.S. embassies seeking to immigrate. The magazine Christian Century warned that letting in more Jews would only exacerbate our Jewish problem. The Daughters of the American Revolution and the American Legion also opposed raising the immigration quota for Jews.

In addition to expert historians and contemporary film footage, Burns and his partners use the fate of families to tell their story. These include Otto Frank, Annes father, and the Franks Amsterdam neighbor-in-hiding Elfriede Geiringer, whose father and brother died in the camps. Now 100 years old, Guy Stern, the only member of his family to escape, returned to Germany in 1944 as a U.S. Army linguist to interrogate German POWs. If I can shorten the war by an hour, maybe I can save a family, he told himself. He broke into tears at a liberated concentration camp. It was skeletons you were talking to, he said.

Daniel Mendelsohn undertook a global odyssey to learn what had happened to his family. The Lost: A Search for Six of the Six Million, his book about this quest, lends particularity to the unimaginable death toll. In the film, he suggests one reason Americans failed to comprehend the plight of the Jews: As it was happening to us, we couldnt believe it. If we couldnt believe it, how could anyone else believe it?

The film describes the evolution of Hitlers thinking. When Germany annexed Austria in 1938, adding 139,000 Jews to his realm, he realized that his thirst for territorial expansion, especially in the East, would increase this population. Extermination became his solution. Four years later, when the Germans discovered that Zyklon could kill Jews for a penny a victim, he ordered a major escalation of the gassing.

By then, President Franklin D. Roosevelt knew what was happening, and much of the American public did, too. In November of 1942, the New York Herald-Tribune exposed the existence of the death camps on its front page. Millions of Jews and others are being gathered up and killed, Edward R. Murrow, the popular radio reporter, told his listeners.

The United States had been at war for less than a year, and its mass bombing of Germany had scarcely begun. D-Day remained a year and a half away. The film describes both Roosevelts dilemma and the lingering anti-Semitism in high places. The president knew he could not divert his military to save the Jews, and he saw no practical way to accomplish this. He aimed instead to win the war as soon as possible and punish the murderers of the Jews afterward. Meanwhile, as rabbis marched on Washington pleading for action, some State Department officials lied about the situation and resisted raising the Jewish immigration quota.

In 1944, Americans at last acknowledged the tragedy, but as the film captures the moment, even this did not induce a willingness to act. Seventy percent of respondents told pollsters they knew Jews were being murdered, but they greatly underestimated the scale of the killing, estimating the death toll at a million when 5 million had already been exterminated. Just 5 percent of those polled favored allowing more European Jews to come to America.

In the films closing scenes, the horrors of Nazi Germany echo in the American present as white supremacists converge on Charlottesville, racists carry out mass shootings of Jews and Black people, Donald Trump scorns immigrants, and a mob assaults the Capitol. Comparing the past to the present so directly is rare in a film by Burns, but sadly, it seems relevant here.

Even when his films stay in their moment, the past echoes in the present. In this one, Daniel Mendelsohn suns up one lesson of studying the Holocaust: The fragility of human behavior is the one thing you really learn. These people we see in the sepia photographs, theyre no different from us. You look at your neighbors, the people at the dry cleaners, the waiters in the restaurant, thats who these people were. Dont kid yourself.

The New Hampshire Bulletin, like the Idaho Capital Sun, is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Hampshire Bulletin maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Dana Wormald for questions: [emailprotected]. Follow New Hampshire Bulletin on Facebook and Twitter.

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The past echoes in the present: A review of Ken Burns' 'The U.S. and the Holocaust - Idaho Capital Sun

Haveri, September 23

A 75-year-old woman on Friday filed a petition for mercy killing before the President through the district administration on grounds of extreme physical and psychological suffering.

According to district authorities, Puttavva Hanumantappa Kottura, a resident of Ranganathanagar near Ranebennur town, owned 30 acres of land. She also had seven residential houses and flats. Sadly, she has filed for euthanasia despite having 11 children.

In her petition, the elderly woman has mentioned that though she has given birth to seven sons and four daughters, none of them are willing to take care of her at this age. Puttavva claimed that it is becoming very difficult for her to lead a life with ailments.

She was spotted on the steps of Haveri District Commissioners' Office sitting alone and weeping.

Later, she submitted the petition for mercy killing before the District Commissioner Sanjaya Shettannavara.

IANS

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Left to fend for herself, 75-year-old mother of 11 seeks euthanasia in Karnataka - The Tribune India

When volunteers first come to Iredell County Animal Services, the volunteer coordinator takes them into the euthanasia room. "I want them to know that it's real."

IREDELL COUNTY, N.C. The people who work at Iredell County Animal Services do it for their passion and love for the animals there that are trying to find their forever homes.

Unfortunately, when those same workers realize some of those pets won't find a family, they go through intense pain and anguish.

"This is probably the greatest group of people I've ever worked with," one shelter worker said. "And they're all feeling it. We're just tired. Everybody's tired. And we need the community's help."

For years, Iredell County Animal Services has had an influx of animals at the shelter. They're faced with the option to fight to get those animals adopted or to humanely euthanize the healthy, adult animals.

"There's no end in sight here," another shelter worker admitted. "This has been going on for years and years and years, so based on that, it just kind of wears on you."

But about a week ago, when that influx became too much, the shelter asked the community to come together to adopt as many as they could. And the community stepped up. But now, they're taking in a lot of dogs again, which means the shelter will be full again.

"We go out every day, [and] we see these animals on chains; we see them being neglected," a shelter worker shared. "You have to keep on pushing. You know that there's more out there that need you. That's what brings us back every day is knowing that there's another dog out there that needs us."

When volunteers first come to Iredell County Animal Services, the volunteer coordinator takes them into the euthanasia room.

"I want them to know that it's real," they said.

"It never gets easy," a shelter worker admitted.

To volunteer with or donate to Iredell County Animal Services or to adopt a new furry family member, visit the website.

Contact Richard DeVayne atrdevayne@wcnc.comand follow him onFacebook,TwitterandInstagram.

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'It never gets easy' | Iredell County Animal Shelter workers share the stress they feel daily but why they keep coming back - WCNC.com

I began my work against the death penalty in the United Statesin 1981. It would be reasonable to suppose that by now, four decades on, I would have seen it all.

Not so. On September 22, Alabama lost a round in a ghoulish battle to execute Alan Miller. Initially, they promised a federal judge that they were ready to experiment with a novel method nitrogen hypoxia (essentially, suffocating him by replacing oxygen in the air with pure nitrogen). The state then had to backtrack, saying they were not sure they knew how to do it, and so they would kill him by lethal injection.

In one of those midnight battles with which I am achingly familiar, the Supreme Court voted five-to-four to let the Alabama executioners go ahead with their ritual sacrifice, but by then it was too late for their probing needles to find a vein. So, Miller is safe for a short while, though doubtless Alabama will set another date soon.

In one sense his close and temporary escape is a metaphor for everything that is wrong with the death penalty. The inspiration for dabbling with nitrogen hypoxia as a new kinder, gentler method of execution is, bizarrely, a television programme recorded several years ago by Michael Portillo, former shadow chancellor for Britains Conservative Party.

In the 1980s, then a member of parliament, Portillo voted to reintroduce capital punishment to the United Kingdom. The bill was defeated. His ardour for executions faded as he learned how many innocent men and women had been sentenced to die. When the subject came up again in the 1990s, he switched his vote. Thankfully, the UK never mustered a majority to step backwards to rejoin the execution governments.

Meanwhile, in 2008, Portillo made a BBC documentarytitled How to Kill a Human Being, focused on making any executions as humane as possible. For his film, he toured around the US considering and rejecting accepted execution methods, each of which he found barbaric. There was the electric chair: Jesse Tafero had a strong claim of innocence (his co-defendant, Sunny Jacobs, was later freed and now lives in Ireland). Taferos head caught fire when Florida electrocuted him in 1990. Portillo illustrated this in his documentary by running 2,400 Volts through a dead pig.

The gas chamber proved no better. The Mississippi Department of Corrections used Zyklon B for their executions. They allowed a BBC crew to film them testing this out on a black bunny rabbit, which died in agony (they were preparing to kill my African-American client Edward Earl Johnson). We sued on the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz to put an end to this barbarism.

Next the proponents of the lethal injection three-drug cocktail claimed it was a more civilised way to kill someone. It was advertised as nothing more than the kind of anaesthetic applied every day in thousands of hospitals.

Yet if there is one rule, it is that the history of executions is full of false promises. They were ignoring an obvious problem: the Hippocratic Oath forbids medical professionals from doing harm. The task of inserting the needle was delegated to technicians who had little skill. Hence even Dr Jay Chapman, who invented the three-drug cocktail, decried botched executions carried out by incompetent people who could not find a vein.

By the way, the three drugs are a sedative, a paralytic and a poison. Why the paralytic? Because it prevents the witnesses from seeing the victim thrash in pain when the sedative fails. Sometimes the paralytic agent failed as well, and the victim thrashed around in pain. All of this became increasingly problematic when the drug companies announced that they did not want their life-saving medicines used to kill people.

In short, none of these methods satisfied Portillo. They were not, he said, humane. Thus far, I can agree with him, having watched six of my clients die in front of me, two executed by each system.

Therefore, Portillo took his quest to an experimental laboratory run by the Dutch air force, where they were studying the hypoxia caused by high-altitude flying. They experimented on Portillo himself: he breathed in pure nitrogen. He described a kind of euphoria as he gradually lost consciousness. All in all, it was a kind way to kill someone, he concluded, as reflected by the calm response of laboratory mice to their euthanasia.

It does not take my 40 years of experience in this dark world to see what nonsense Portillos claim was: experimental mice have no idea that an omnipotent and vengeful government is planning to kill them. A human being, his euphoria replaced by panic, would tear at the gas mask, and howl in terror and we would have to adopt another protocol to protect witnesses from the horror of it all.

Yet it is the extraordinary progenesis of this new form of execution that is most shocking. Surely an American government should not elect to execute its citizens based on a television programme?

Thus it was that this week we found ourselves on the cusp of conducting a human experiment on Miller, who was convicted for shooting three people a senseless tragedy of a nature that takes place far too often in the US. He grew up in extreme poverty in a house overrun by rodents, the family money spent on his fathers drug habit. He was represented at trial by a court-appointed lawyer who made it clear to the jury that he did not want the job.

All of this is, sadly, fairly typical of capital punishment, where those without capital get the punishment.

Perhaps none of this matters to some people. Portillo interviewed New York University law Professor Robert Blecker, wary and wiry, outside a prison. As Portillo outlined his proposal for a supposedly humane method of execution, Blecker exhibited a rising disgust. Punishment is supposed to be painful, he said.The idea of a killer dying easily would be the opposite of justice.

Blecker must be a very superior person to feel comfortable wishing agony on people he has never met, about whom he knows so little.I wonder whether he will one day change his mind, as Portillo did, in the face of the diverse fallibilities that characterise the rest of us.

Regardless, since 1947, the Nuremberg Code (PDF) has stated that no [human] experiment should be conducted where there is reason to believe that death or disabling injury will occur. Perhaps we should accept that our grotesque human experiments should be left in centuries past, where they belong.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial stance.

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Death in the USA a botched experimental execution - Al Jazeera English

Animal shelters and rescue groups traditionally have breathed the tiniest sigh of relief each year when fall arrives. Although the challenges never fully go away, getting past the nightmare of kitten and puppy season each year is a milestone.

But animal rescue experts fear that those sighs of relief are things of the past.

Shelters are seeing soaring numbers of pets being surrendered due to the economy and the housing crisis, according to the Bissell Pet Foundation.

More stray animals are being brought in every day, no matter the season, and more adoptable pets are being euthanized than they have been in years past because shelters are simply too full to house them all.

Its from that battle-weary perspective that Sand Springs Animal Welfare Coordinator Tracy Arvidson sees the smallest ray of hope the Bissell Pet Foundations fall national Empty the Shelters event.

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More than 280 animal shelters in 42 states will offer reduced-price adoptions during the Oct. 1-8 event.

Empty the Shelters is the largest funded adoption event in the country and has helped more than 117,615 pets find homes in 47 states and Canada since its inception in 2016.

Through the Empty the Shelters campaign, the Bissell Pet Foundation underwrites a portion of the adoption fees at participating shelters, leaving adopters to pay no more than $50 per animal.

In the Tulsa area, Sand Springs Animal Welfare is joined by the Humane Society of Tulsa and the Washington County SPCA in Bartlesville in participation.

TheEmpty the Shelters events do well for us, Arvidson said.

She said the Sand Springs shelter is as overfull today as it has been for a number of months.

Twice since mid-June the shelter has sounded the alarm that it was at the precipice of having to euthanize healthy, adoptable pets simply because of capacity problems.

According to the Humane Society of the United States, the euthanasia of healthy, adoptable cats and dogs in U.S. shelters had fallen to its lowest point in history recently, but the Bissell Pet Foundation said in July that the euthanasia rate for homeless dogs was up 22% in the first quarter of 2022 alone.

Although the Sand Springs shelter technically has more cats and kittens than dogs at the moment, its able to house more cats in a single pen because litters of kittens can be kept together.

With the dogs, we have to keep them more separate due to fighting over food, Arvidson said, so we are actually more overcrowded with dogs.

She said before last falls Empty the Shelters event that potential adopters through Sand Springs Animal Welfare complete an adoption contract and are interviewed at the shelter so staff members can try to match them with the right pet.

Plus, adoption through the shelter is pretty much a no-risk proposition, Arvidson said. If by some chance the match doesnt work out, adopters can return the pet to the shelter.

Even mostly successful matches might need a helping hand, though, and thats where the shelters resources come into play.

Besides an adoption package that includes spaying or neutering and vaccinations, a free month of coverage through a pet insurance group and a free week of online behavioral training, shelter staff members can help adopters find resources such as trainers, groomers and other necessities.

Shelter staff members also email adopters periodically to check in and make sure everything is going well, Arvidson said.

Cathy Bissell, who founded the Bissell Pet Foundation in 2011, said this has been a challenging year for our nations animal shelters. The devastating increase in owner surrenders has left thousands of socialized, house-trained and leash-trained pets desperate to find a home.

Our fall Empty the Shelters will support the adoption of thousands of pets across the country, helping shelters in this critical time, she said. Opening your home to a shelter pet saves a life and creates space to give another pet a chance.

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Sand Springs Animal Welfare officials hoping there's more to 'Empty the Shelters' event than just a name - Tulsa World

Introduction

Currently, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) considers bison (Bison bison) a non-amenable, exotic species. This designation has been applied because bison were first considered a native wildlife game species under states laws (i.e. public trust doctrine circa 1700s) and most wildlife laws pre-date agricultural laws (see Geer vs. Connecticut, 161 U.S. 519, 1896: 529530) and (Byrd et al., 2015). However, in 1979, the Supreme Court decision in Hughes vs. Oklahoma (441 U.S. 322, 1979) declared that wildlife were subject to federal regulation under the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution, because wildlife inherently move between states. State fish and wildlife agencies are still the de facto regulatory authority for setting bag limits and harvest quotas for each region.

In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln established the U.S. Department of Agriculture to promote U.S. agriculture. Shortly thereafter, this agency became the regulatory authority for food safety. However, the food safety mission was fundamentally at odds with the original agricultural promotion mission. The Federal Meat Inspection Act (FMIA) of 1906 stipulates that products made entirely from wild game product are not meat and, therefore, are not amenable to mandatory FSIS inspection (P.L. 113-79, 2014).

Since the early 1990s, various attempts have been made to convert bison to an amenable species under the purview of the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) instead of under the regulatory jurisdiction of wildlife game meat of the U.S. Department of Human and Health Services Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This is largely an issue that directly and immediately affects the private sector of the bison management system (BMS), but there would also be indirect effects on three additional sectors of substantial influence for bison management, including: Tribal, non-profit conservation NGOs, and public agencies (Martin et al., 2021). While there may be some considerable benefits to classifying bison as an amenable species (e.g. increased number of commercial facilities approved to receive and slaughter bison), there are also considerable consequences that may outweigh potential benefits. Of primary concern are issues relating to wide selection options for stakeholder harvest systems mobile field harvest versus conventional stationary abattoir. This is an important point, while ante-mortem inspection is currently voluntary for USDA inspection, it is not mandatory effectively allowing for culturally significant traditional and ceremonial kills on tribal lands to occur without inspection and allowing for bison hunts to occur without inspection. Changing bison to an amenable species would compel inspection at every harvest type with limited exceptions (Byrd et al., 2015: 352). Moreover, small meat plants (i.e. less than 25 employees) that are either state-only inspected or custom-exempt-only would lose their competitive place in the market (Byrd et al., 2015). While the USDA FSIS allows for field harvest to be inspected (U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Safety and Inspection Service, 2021), there are few official exotic animal establishments with proper authorization (9 C.F.R. 352, 1985: 3) to process bison, therefore, USDA FSIS non-amenable field inspection is difficult to execute for bison.

Mobile harvest impact on quality of meat and carcasses

One major area of concern for consumers with maintaining status quo is the effect of the harvesting system on meat quality, carcass sanitation and consumer preference. Galbraith (2011) reported that mobile, field harvest systems produce bison meat that was lowest in cortisol (i.e. stress hormone), minimized carcass bruising and maintained normal meat pH that ranked highest in scores of tenderness and palatability compared to conventional, stationary abattoir-produced bison meat. More recently, a report by Janssen (2020) corroborated these findings that harvest system influences cortisol levels (lower with mobile units), and some characteristics of meat and carcass quality, however Janssen (2020) reported that, harvest systems had minimal impact on consumer preference. Scientific evidence supports that mobile field harvest systems are as good as, or in some measures, better than conventional stationary abattoir facilities concerning animal welfare, meat and carcass quality, and meat acceptability to consumers.

Background to Bison Management System (BMS)

The BMS is comprised of four interconnected and interdependent sectors, all acting in concert for the unified goal of restoring bison to their original habitats (Martin et al., 2021). Those four sectors are (1) the private commercial operations/sector with the purpose of restoring bison on private lands, while establishing an economic market for bison meat; (2) Tribal governments and Native producers restoring bison on Tribal lands and providing a sustainable meat source for Native American communities; (3) the non-profit conservation non-governmental organization (NGO) sector, such as The Nature Conservancy and zoos, that restore bison on a mix of trust and deeded lands, and (4) the state and federal public agency sector, including the U.S. Department of Interior agencies of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on Wildlife Refuges and the U.S. National Park Service on National Parks, in addition to several state wildlife agencies, with mandates to protect and restore bison on public lands.

Commercially, the bison industry started in the 1960s, but the interconnected relationships of each sector trace their roots to the early 1900s between private conservationists, such as Charles Goodnight, James Scotty Philip, C.J. Buffalo Jones, as well as public servants, such as President Theodore Roosevelt, George Bird Grinnell, William T. Hornaday, to name a few. In parallel, Native producers and Tribal governments have been restoring bison on their lands since the late 1800s, working in concert with several public agencies and innumerous private operations (Shamon et al., 2022). While these sectors have seemingly conflicting interests, this perspective is grounded in a zero-sum mentality at odds with reality of a unified mission to restore bison on lands regardless of land ownership and tenure.

Definitions, Codes, Rule, and Regulations

Exotic Species

Currently, under U.S. Codes and Federal Regulations (hereafter, referred to as CFR), bison/North American buffalo (Bison bison) are defined as an exotic or rather, undomesticated species (21 C.F.R. 110, 1986). However, bison are technically a native wildlife species to North America, and their status as a wild game species (i.e., native wildlife) predetermines their undomesticated status. Therefore, bison are considered exotic under the USDA.

Non-amenable Species

Meat produced from wild game species, exotics, remain under the regulatory jurisdiction of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) (21 C.F.R. 110, 1986) including those game species raised in captivity on game farms/ranches.

Voluntary Inspection

Exotic species, including bison, are not subject to mandatory meat inspection; though, they are eligible for voluntary inspection under USDA FSIS (9 C.F.R. 352, 1985). If inspected and passed, products will bear the triangle mark (9 C.F.R. 317.3, 1970) (Figure 1).

USDA FSIS meat inspection stamp. For a description of this graphic, please call SDSU Extension at 605-688-4792.

Figure 1. Example triangle mark of passed voluntary USDA FSIS meat inspection.

Ante-Mortem Inspection

Prior to slaughter (i.e. antemortem), inspection is only conducted occasionally for non-amenable and exotic species under the FDA, as shown in the following excert:

shall, where and to the extent considered necessary by the Administrator and under such instructions as he may issue from time to time, be made on the day of slaughter of an exotic animal, in one of the following listed ways or as determined by the Administrator. Humane handling of an exotic animal during ante-mortem inspection shall be in accordance with the provisions contained in (9 C.F.R. 313, 1979: 2). Immediately after the animal is stunned or killed, it shall be shackled, hoisted, stuck and bled (9 C.F.R. 352.10, 1985).

Moreover, for all exotic species being slaughtered under voluntary inspection of the USDA FSIS, animal ante-mortem inspection shall adhere to regulations listed under 9 C.F.R. 309 (1970) and USDA FSIS Directive 6100.1 (2020).

Killing and/or Stunning

The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) recommends euthanasia by gunshot in close proximity under restraint at a stationary abattoir (9 C.F.R. 309, 1970; 9 C.F.R. 352, 1985: a; 9 C.F.R. 313.16, 2022) with a center-fire rifle that has greater than 1,000 feet-pound muzzle energy (e.g. higher caliber center-fire rifles, such as .30-30, .270, .30-06 and similar (AVMA, 2020: 67)). Note: the majority of handguns produce muzzle energy too low, well below 1,000 feet-pound, thus are inappropriate for euthanasia of mature bison (National Farm Animal Care Council, 2017). The preferred target site for gunshot euthanasia is on the forehead, approximately 1 inch (2.5 cm) above an imaginary line connecting the bottom of the horns (Figure 2). The angle of entry should be perpendicular to the skull (AVMA, 2020). However, USDA FSIS allows captive bolt euthanasia (9 C.F.R. 313.15, 1979), but AVMA recommends against captive bolt (AVMA, 2020).

For field kills at a distance, AVMA recommends similar high-caliber gunshot muzzle energy to those stated above, but the target may be the frontal head (Figure 2), lateral head behind the ear, or heart shot to the thorax (9 C.F.R. 352.10a, 1985; AVMA, 2020).

Diagram showing preferred target site for bison euthanasia.a Target mark is on the forehead of the bison between the bisons horns and eyes. For a description of this graphic, please call SDSU Extension at 605-688-4792.

Figure 2. The preferred target site for bison for gunshot euthanasia is on the forehead approximately 1 inch (2.5 cm) above an imaginary line connecting the bottom of the horns. The angle of entry should be perpendicular to the skull (AVMA, 2020).

Post-Mortem Inspection

After slaughter, as outlined in the following excerpt:

Post-mortem inspection of reindeer, elk, deer, antelope, bison and water buffalo shall be conducted in accordance with the provisions contained in 9 C.F.R. 310 (1970) or as determined by the Administrator. The post-mortem examination of field ante-mortem-inspected exotic animals must occur in the shortest length of time practicable and on the day that field ante-mortem inspection is performed to minimize the changes in the carcass which can affect the post-mortem examination, disposition and wholesomeness of the carcass and its parts. The post-mortem veterinarian shall inspect and make the disposition of all incoming U.S. Suspect tagged exotic animals. (9 C.F.R. 352.11, 1985).

Moreover, for all exotic species being slaughtered under voluntary inspection of the USDA FSIS, post-mortem inspection shall adhere to regulations under USDA FSIS Directive 6100.2 (2016).

Cooperative Interstate Shipment (CIS) Program

Cooperative Interstate Shipment (CIS) provides an opportunity for approved state-inspected meat and poultry processors to ship their products across state lines. Under the CIS agreement, States may inspect meat in approved establishments for shipment throughout the United States. The CIS program is limited to establishments located in the 27 states that have an established Meat and Poultry Inspection (MPI) program. To be eligible to participate in the CIS program, state MPI programs must meet a number of criteria to demonstrate that the inspection that it provides to state-inspected plants will be the same as the inspection that FSIS provides to official federal establishments. For instance, a state must demonstrate that it has the necessary legal authority to administer and enforce requirements that are the same as the FMIA and applicable regulations. In addition, the state must collect regulatory samples at the same frequency and use the same analytical methods at laboratories that meet the same level of accreditation as the FSIS laboratories. The assigned state inspectors may remain as the establishments onsite inspectors, provided they have the same training and inspect the plant under the same as regulatory standards as their federal counterparts in FSIS-inspected establishments. FSIS provides ongoing oversight of the CIS program to ensure that participating states maintain and operate their same as programs in a manner that complies with all applicable federal statutes and regulations and follows FSIS directives and notices. FSIS reimburses the states for 60% of their costs associated with providing this interstate eligible inspection service.

The CIS program was created by the 2008 Farm Bill, but it was launched in 2012 under Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. Currently, 9 states (Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Missouri, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Vermont and Wisconsin) participate in the program to promote the expansion of business opportunities for state-inspected meat and poultry establishments. Under CIS, selected state-inspected establishments that comply with federal inspection requirements are permitted to ship their product in interstate commerce. For more information, visit the Cooperative Interstate Shipping Program website.

3% Rule

Processed products that include both wild game and amenable meat or poultry may be subject to mandatory FSIS inspection. Processed products generally are amenable to mandatory inspection if they contain as little as 3% raw or 2% cooked meat from an amenable animal (e.g. beef, pork, chicken, etc.), together with other safe and suitable ingredients. If produced in accordance with all applicable regulatory requirements, any product subject to mandatory inspection will bear the round USDA mark of inspection (Amann, 2013; Byrd et al., 2015). For example, a meat product containing three percent beef and 97% bison, is subject to mandatory USDA inspection and will carry the mandatory, round inspection mark. Because it has been federally inspected, it can be sold and shipped across the United States, even though it could contain 97% of state-inspected meat (Byrd et al., 2015).

Conclusion

In conclusion, while status of amenable vs. non-amenable species seems confusing and complex, there are associated benefits and consequences for each definition. Considering that there are multiple pathways for transporting and marketing bison and bison products across state lines, this creates many pathways and avenues for innovative and creative ways for producers to deliver bison and bison products to consumers, especially for small and medium-size bison operations.

SDSU Extension

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Are bison amenable or non-amenable? How does the definition of bison affect harvest systems and quality of meat and carcasses? - Tri-State Livestock...