The animal protectors collected 286,000 companion animals in 2020 (162,000 dogs and 124,000 cats) and, although adoptions increased by 15% in the confinement period of the pandemic, between March and May, the abandonment of pets registered an increase of between 5 and 10% in the following months.
Even so, the dropout rate decreased over the past year by 6% in Spain, based on the study ‘He would never do it 2021’ by the Affinity Foundation, whose data was released this week in the presentation, in Madrid, from ‘El Regalo’, a children’s story to give a different look at the treatment of animals.
“The zero rate of abandonment in one hundred percent of reception in the pandemic is not real & rdquor ;, explained the author of the story, Virgilio Martínez, who has verified that after home isolation there was a rebound rate because many of the families who adopted at that time were not aware of “the obligations that & rdquor; a pet.
For this reason, Martínez, Animal Marketing Manager at Zoetis, the company behind the story, has warned that this Christmas it is preferable to give a book than a dog or a cat, since these beings “are not a gift & rdquor ;, but a” long-term contract & rdquor; that not all people can assume.
Specific, the number of dogs collected by protectors decreased by 11.5% compared to 2019, the largest decrease in recent times, while the arrival of cats to reception centers grew 0.6% in that period; of all of them, less than half of the animals that arrive at the shelters manage to be adopted.
The Spanish singer Soraya Arnelas took part in the premiere of the story, which tells the cross stories of a dog and a cat who, after becoming friends in a shelter, meet years later at a veterinary clinic after being adopted, who revealed how the two dogs who he adopted years ago are now part of his family.
“This campaign focuses on the Christmas season, because we have a bad habit of giving them away & rdquor;, has commented Arnelas, who valued the reading of this work so that minors understand that people are “the gift & rdquor; for your pets, not the other way around.
Legal regime of animals
Precisely, on December 2, the Congress of Deputies approved the proposed Law of the PSOE and United We Can, which provides for the modification of the Civil Code, the Mortgage Law and the Civil Procedure Law on the legal regime of animals so that stop being considered objects or immovable beings.
The initiative, ratified with the support of all parties except VOX, which voted against, and the Popular Party (PP), which abstained, recognizes the nature of “sentient beings or living beings endowed with sensitivity & rdquor; of animals in Spain, where 40% of households have a pet, around sixteen million dogs and cats.
For her part, the veterinarian at the Calma clinic, in Toledo, Natividad de la Fuente has asked “Responsibility & rdquor; to families interested in adopting and he has recommended that they be advised by professionals regarding the process of fostering these animals.
In its first edition, twenty thousand stories of ‘The Gift’ have been printed, which will be distributed free of charge in twelve hundred veterinary clinics throughout Spain, although a digital version will also be available on social networks.