How do Dogs and Cats Fit Into Mere Saathi’s Plans for Domestic Animal Care?

Based on our fact-finding among the villagers of Pakhiralaya in the Sunderbans, it’s clear that our most important work will be with domestic herds and flocks – mostly goats and cows, but also chickens and sheep.  

                                          

Although we conducted dog and cat clinics during our initial visit to Kolkata in July, in the villages we will focus only on neutering  them to decrease the population, and vaccinating them for rabies to reduce the risk of biting humans and causing rabies.  We'll also address basic health issues of the dogs kept by the villagers – such as parasites that can be transmitted to the humans – if the villagers choose to bring them in.

When dogs are brought to us, we’ll also vaccinate them for distemper virus, not really for the dogs sake, but more importantly, because distemper can be spread to big cats, tigers included.  We’re concerned about this, even though there haven’t yet been reports of distemper affecting tigers of the Sunderbans specifically.  We want to be a part of preventing what we’ve seen in Africa -- outbreaks that have killed many lions.  This grows out of increasingly close association between lions and humans (and their dogs).

The villagers also expressed concern about dog bites, which are common among the village’s children.