A Pet's Life Rests in Your Hands

Abstract

There are many different aspects of animal welfare in animal shelters. Analyzing these different aspects of animal welfare in New York animal shelters will ultimately help answer the question, what role does animal welfare play in animal shelters toward the outcome of euthanasia versus adoption? Many of these different aspects of an animal's health care during its time in a shelter can potentially have long- term ramifications for the rest of its life. Medical care including but not limited to vaccinations, spay and neuter, common diseases, and stress levels all are major components of an animal's well-being. Behavioral patterns and how they may be influenced by stress levels, the environment that surrounds the animals, and their veterinary care can also be highly influential in sheltered animals' ultimate outcomes. This is all extremely important to animal shelters in New York as it has long-term implications for strays and euthanasia. The shorter amount of time an animal is in a shelter, the more quickly spaces in a shelter can open up for more animals on the street that need a shelter to stay in. Shelters should be doing everything they can to make sure that these animals are getting adopted as quickly as possible with the goal of avoiding euthanasia or any other harmful path according to veterinarians and animal rights activists. And if they aren't that could be due to a lack of effort on their part or it could be due to a lack of resources and money. There are a series of regulations are in place to ensure animal welfare is at the level it needs to be to encourage a safe, happy and healthy future for the animals.