REPORT OF APRIL 2010
With the generous support of many artists and sponsors, members and donors, we have already been able to castrate and provide medical care to more than 3,000 stray animals on Kos.
Here, we would like to thank you wholeheartedly on behalf of our four-legged friends. Our work would not be possible without your generous support!
Thanks to our experience with regular operations on the island since 2005, we were also able to register great successes during our last castration project in March 2010. Once again, we were able to castrate over 370 animals and provide medical care to many more in March of this year.
As a result of the dedicated work of the experienced ETN medical teams from Germany, some of whom have over 20 years of professional experience, and the support of our voluntary helpers on site, sick and emaciated animals are now a much less common sight on the island. The stray population has been successfully stabilized at all places, where the animals could be treated. We are proud of this experienced and professional team and the truly astounding work that it has accomplished.
The high-quality feed bought by us and regularly distributed by our helpers across the island is continually strengthening the animals and this is clearly visible. The stray animals look much healthier and more vital.
Despite the initial skepticism of many island inhabitants, the acceptance rate among locals has increased due to our professional work and now more and more people are helping us on site to catch the animals, to castrate them, to provide them with medical treatment and feed them throughout the year. Therefore, we will even be able to expand our operations this year and hopefully also provide care to animals on neighboring islands of Kos during our next project in November.
Drawbacks – problems on site:
Local veterinarians have never really appreciated what we do here and are now trying to boycott our work and bring us to court. Since we no longer cooperate with them for this reason, a local veterinarian even went as far as to refuse to treat a terminally ill cat (a photograph is available in the report). Unfortunately, it seems that for Greek veterinarians, making money is more important than promoting the wellbeing of animals.
There are four veterinarians on Kos and none of them treats street animals for free. All of these expenses are borne by private animal protection organizations or animal welfare advocates.
We also do not get any support from Greek politicians - neither the mayor of Kos, nor any other political actor is helping us. We will now defend our right to castrate the animals on site in the EU Parliament. For this step, however, we will also need a lawyer and this is likely to be very expensive. Notwithstanding, this course of action seems inevitable at the moment as there is no other way to actually change anything in Greece.
In fact, the whole story is quite preposterous considering the current economic situation of Greece. One would assume that the Greek state would take interest in our actions as they are perceived extremely positively by tourists.
Please help us to continue to save lives and keep up our successful work! We still need urgent financial assistance and voluntary helpers in order to move ahead with our project because, unfortunately, we do not get any kind of help by the official bodies!
Alas, this is still a part of everyday life in Greece – 2 examples, which speak volumes about this country:
In Greece, stray animals are regularly poisoned at a massive scale, primarily during the Easter holidays. And this happens regardless of whether the animals are castrated or not: This year, too, we found out that many of the animals that we had castrated earlier have been poisoned!
BABY CATS ABANDONED IN A CARDBOARD BOX UNDER THE SCORCHING SUN – ONLY 2 OF 14 ARE STILL ALIVE!
Although our project on Kos is already having an effect and although the cat and dog populations have been successfully stabilized wherever we were able to castrate, there are unfortunately still many people on the island, who have no respect for other living creatures and those people continue to poison and abuse the animals.
Thus, several days ago, our fellow animal welfare advocate and on-site helper, Vangelis Trakossa, found a box containing 14 baby cats abandoned by heartless people, who do not care about animals. The cats had spent several days under the burning sun and were dying of hunger and thirst. Only two kittens could be saved and are currently struggling for their very survival at a private foster home!
In order to treat these kittens, we urgently need financial support. A donation or a sponsorship specifically for these little kittens would enable us to finance the treatment of the poor little things; this is because medication and special food are very expensive here.
The sponsorship fee for a cat is just € 12.- per month (you can find more info and the application form here)
We would also very much appreciate individual donations, which will be used specifically to buy medication and food for the animals.
SCRUFFY – OWNER REFUSES TO ALLOW TREATMENT
The owner of a sick, approx. 10 year old tomcat, whose teeth were in such a bad condition that it couldn't even eat anymore, declined our offer to treat the animal, even though we were willing to assume all expenses! Only after threatening her to publish the story did she agree to let us take care of the tomcat. The tomcat is currently being treated and nursed in the animal shelter of Vangelis Trakossa. Here, too, we desperately need money to continue to treat and take care of Scruffy. We are also urgently looking for a permanent home for him and the one-eyed long-haired cat so our plea goes out to all cat friends, who wish to give a better future to an animal that has already gone through a lot of suffering!
Please accept our heartfelt gratitude on behalf of the vulnerable stray animals of Greece!
