Tamworth Regional Council and RSPCA deliver a complementary health clinic for dogs and cats as part of the bi-annual Tamworth Healthy Pet Day at the Youthie on Thursday, May 23. Video by Jonathan Hawes
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00:00 [Indistinct chatter]
00:11 Today's all about helping those who are financially challenged
00:16 get their dogs and cats checked by a vet,
00:20 hopefully get them vaccinated, microchipped,
00:23 and even more importantly,
00:25 hopefully they'll sign up to get them desexed at a later date.
00:29 The RSPCA subsidises the desexing,
00:35 but as a first, we, Council, are also subsidising that desexing.
00:40 So for today, we've put in $20,000,
00:44 which is to be focusing on desexing of the animals
00:50 that are booked in for today.
00:51 The purpose of a Healthy Pet Day is that we are coming to communities
00:55 that have been identified because they're either less advantaged,
01:01 there's animal population problems, or parvovirus problems.
01:05 So we identify the areas, come in,
01:07 and offer free core preventative pet healthcare services
01:12 to pension or healthcare card holders in that area.
01:15 We're expecting over 60 dogs and nearly 30 cats.
01:19 We've got three vets working here.
01:21 We've actually extended the time today
01:23 so we can accommodate even more animals.
01:25 And interestingly, nearly 40% of the animals we're seeing today
01:31 have never seen a vet before,
01:33 and nearly 20% of those animals only access the vet if they are sick.
01:38 So that means that they're not receiving their annual vaccinations,
01:44 getting a health check,
01:46 seeing if there's any other issues going on for them.
01:49 It's far better to be preventative about things like parvovirus,
01:53 which comes via vaccines,
01:56 than to deal with an animal that has parvo
01:59 and has a very high fatality rate,
02:01 unless it seeks expensive vetting.
02:03 We've handled, I think it's 570 dogs
02:07 have come through the companion animal centre since the 1st of July.
02:12 So that's a lot of dogs.
02:15 We've rehomed 110 through Paws for Life,
02:19 which is really exciting and we're very, very proud of that.
02:23 And we've sent about 115 dogs off to different rescues around Australia.
02:29 [no audio]