Animal Volunteer(s) Needed

Many of us are pet owners and sometimes we need medical care for our charges. As they age the need for care increases, sometimes just to end their suffering. This of course is very hard on human owners but it can be even harder when treatment cannot be found in time.

I'm referring to what one has to do when a pet has a serious medical condition after normal working hours. The only solution if you can call it that is Redding or Medford where veterinary service is on call 24 hours a day. That's an hour and a half away, not enough time to treat a serious injury or a poisoning. Most animals would suffer and perhaps die before ever reaching either city.

At some time in the past there was a cooperative effort among vets here to provide after hours care. Evidently it was a rotating on-call schedule split between north and south county. It must have worked for a time since people in animal care remember it, but something went awry. Perhaps someone did not pay a bill. Maybe somebody complained. Some vet got upset at another vet perhaps. Egos may have gotten bruised. Who knows. But today we are back to the Redding - Medford choice. Again.

Some of us are taking another look at this, though. People who work in shelters, animal control, and other pet environments share a growing concern with this lack of care. Too often they see injured or diseased animals suffer in their arms and sometimes perish before an office opens the following day.

So we have been meeting and gathering ideas. This week we wrote every veterinary office in the county to solicit their input. We also invited them to our next breakfast meeting at the Black Bear Diner in Mt. Shasta on April 15. (We also welcome any concerned pet owner to the gathering, it is not a closed setting.)

The title for this article is one idea being tossed around. Some people with veterinary experience in different areas of our huge county who would agree to be on call for emergencies. And there are other ideas that could be layered on top of this one to not only make coverage better but make it easy on those who provide it.

Please call or write me with your suggestions. April 15 is not that far away and I would very much like to have new ideas to put on the table. You can email me at batchelder@gotsky.com, call me at 938-0385, or just write to 5225 Muskrat Rd., Weed, CA 96094.

This situation has "humane" written all over it and while veterinary care is a business like any other it's inconceivable to me that they don't care or don't see the suffering that can go on after hours. Surely that's why the vets organized themselves to try and address it in the past. Perhaps with our help and volunteers we can urge them to try again. Even though pet owners spend good money at the local vet offices this really isn't about money. It's about compassion, and the dedicated will to prevent suffering in helpless animals.

We need all the help we can get. There has to be an answer.