Vets Beyond Borders Saves Lives

How an Aussie organisation is helping save lives in India and how you can help

Street dogs are not only a part of life in parts of India, they have also become a crucial part of the local ecosystem. As scavengers, garbage collectors and rodent controllers, the dogs help manage the rat and feral cat populations that thrive in impoverished communities.

Many of the dogs are poorly treated, but for the lucky ones, community ownership means a regular diet of food scraps, status as the local watchdog, children to play with and safe place to sleep. But while human-animal contact can be beneficial to people and dogs alike, it can also be deadly.

The problem

Feral, stray and community dogs are the main reservoirs of rabies in a country like India. Although a preventable disease, rabies currently kills one person every 10 minutes, the majority of them children under 15 years of age. Children love to play with dogs, but are less likely to report bites and scratches, so may not receive the appropriate lifesaving treatment (which in any case is not always available or affordable).

The solution

Vets Beyond Borders (VBB) is an Australian-based not-for-profit organisation dedicated to improving animal welfare and public health in India and other developing countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Thanks to VBB, Indian street dogs are dewormed, desexed and vaccinated against rabies, improving dog health and reducing the risk of rabies infection in the community.

VBB vets also engage with local communities to conduct animal welfare and public health education programmes in schools and communities outlining rabies prevention and promoting responsible dog ownership. Training local veterinarians to improve their surgical skills is another integral part of the VBB philosophy to improve animal welfare in developing nations.

Vets Beyond Borders is reliant on donations to carry out its good work, and Bayer Advantage is proud to announce that it has so far donated $10,000 to VBB in the form of $1 for every copy of David Darcy’s fantastic book A Little Help For Our Friends sold. According to Jenny O’Donnell, VBB Executive Officer, this money ‘will greatly assist us in continuing with our projects, helping animals and delivering community and public health benefits in developing countries. Most of these animals would otherwise never see a vet and would be left to suffer and breed on the streets, potentially continuing to spread serious diseases to humans, such as rabies.’

HOW YOU CAN HELP

A Little Help For Our Friends costs $14.95 and is available in vet  clinics and at Dymocks. Bayer Advantage continues to donate $1 to Vets Beyond Borders for every copy sold, enabling VBB to continue its vital work. online, Myer and Leading Edge bookstores.

VBB also welcomes volunteers. For more information, go to www.vetsbeyondborders.org.

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