I can save any animal but it’s not always right, says TV vet
Scientific advances mean that keeping pets alive is now a moral decision
VETERINARY science has advanced so far that pets can be treated for almost any ailment, one of the nation’s leading vets has said.
Prof Noel Fitzpatrick, a veterinary surgeon, said that technological developments had created a “seismic shift in modern ethics” and that keeping animals alive is now a “moral” decision.
Vets have to focus more than ever on whether a pet’s future quality of life would justify surgery, he said.
Prof Fitzpatrick, who stars in The Supervet, the Channel 4 series, runs a practice in Surrey, where he has introduced pioneering surgical techniques, including fitting pets with bionic legs.
He said: “The bottom line now is that anything is possible, if you have a blood and nerve supply. That means that we now have a line in the sand: not what is ‘possible’, but what is ‘right’. In the past it was just the case of if it wasn’t possible, you’d move to euthanasia.
“For me it’s never about the money, or whether I can do the operation, because everything is pretty much doable, and if you can’t do it today, you can do it tomorrow. It has got to the point where I am 3D-printing parts of joints with living tissue in them. I have a moral tightrope to walk every day.” The new series of The
Supervet will feature a cat called Jersey, that became the first three-legged feline to have a hip replacement. The animal, which lost a leg after being hit by a car, presented a unique problem, because to enable her to balance, the new hip needed to move in a different way to that required for four legs.
Prof Fitzpatrick said: “It was a sweet cat. She had a slipping kneecap and really severe hip arthritis. Most cats can manage three legs, but this one couldn’t. The pills weren’t working. The owner wanted to consider total hip replacement.
“It would have been easy to put her to sleep. Was that the right choice? The other options for pain control were suboptimal. But it worked.”
The series also features a Mr Mac, a six-and-a-half-foot-long Great Dane, that suffered from “wobblers disease”, in which its neck bone had grown abnormally, squashing the spinal cord. Prof Fitzpatrick created custom 3D-printed implants which fused five of the dog’s vertebrae together, releasing pressure on the spinal cord.
The vet said that he faced a “huge moral responsibility” on a daily basis, to take decisions that would ultimately benefit the animals.
But he claimed that because of the history of animal testing of drugs and procedures, humans owed animals a moral duty to allow them to benefit from modern advances in technology.
Prof Fitzpatrick added: “They’ve given us all their lives for research, quite simply it’s time to give something back.” The Supervet returns at 8pm on Wednesday on Channel 4.
It is a scenario being played up and down the country right now. With spring and Easter upon us, as a mother of two daughters who love all things cute and fluffy, I impulse-bought two rabbits last year. They caught my eye when a family friend was offering two sister bunnies on Facebook. One was white and fluffy, the other was grey, and both were barely the size of an apple. I thought they’d make an ideal first pet for my daughters Sophia, five, and Rosie, two. Not to mention cheap and easy ones.
But I soon found out otherwise. The girls were thrilled with the newly named Flopsy and Daisy for the first week, but then the novelty wore off. And it did for me too. By the time I finished work and battled through bath and bedtime, I wanted a glass of wine – not to go into my dark, cold garden to feed the bunnies and clean their hutch.
Statistics show that more than a third of rabbits are given away when a child loses interest; 55 per cent of rabbits entering rescue centres are bought in spring and 80 per cent of bunnies bought specifically at Easter are given up (or die due to neglect) within a year.
Which is why, almost 40 years after the Dogs Trust launched its iconic campaign that reminded us all that “A dog is for life and not just for Christmas”, rabbit welfare charities are launching a similar campaign to stop people buying bunnies this Easter.
“This is the time of year when many people rush out to buy a bunny,” says Lisa Whitty, from rabbit welfare organisation Make Mine Chocolate, which has launched a campaign to encourage people to buy chocolate, rather than real, bunnies, this month. “Within a few months of Easter, the already over-stretched rabbit rescue centres are then inundated with unwanted bunnies.”
“The pet shops stock up on bunnies around now, often from local breeders,” she says. “Four years ago we rescued 69 bunnies from a small house, where they were being bred for pet shops. The breeder was told they were no longer needed and became overwhelmed with the number they had. The poor bunnies were kept in the most despicable conditions. This happens all over the UK and it’s why rabbits bought from pet stores often come with illness.”
Amy De-Keyzer from the RSPCA says: “We discourage people from buying rabbits on impulse as Easter presents. Every year over a thousand abandoned rabbits come into RSPCA care.” If you do want a rabbit, Amy suggests adopting a pair (being alone causes them huge stress).
Lisa also suggests inquiring at your local rabbit rescue centre – current estimates suggest that 67,000 rabbits pass through overstretched rescue centres every year. “The advantage of this is that the people at rescue centres almost certainly know more about how to properly care for rabbits than someone working in a pet shop or garden centre,” says Lisa.
While I didn’t give our rabbits away, within a month of having them the ramp in their hutch broke, so I found a local rabbit rescue centre who took them in for “bunny boarding” for a few weeks while I organised a new hutch. While I was there – chatting to the owner Helen, who devotes her time to rescuing and caring for abandoned rabbits – I realised just how little I knew about our new pets.
The first thing Helen told me is that most of the hutches bought online or in pet stores (including my own £100 Amazon one) are made from cheap Chinese fir that rots within a year or two. Secondly, forget the TV-sized hutches of your Seventies childhood. Rabbits need at least a 6ft x 3ft x 3ft hutch plus a similar-sized run.
On Helen’s recommendation I had a hutch made by a Devon-based carpenter. Including the courier to my Surrey home, it cost an eye-watering £500. Then there was the £78 to have them vaccinated, £160 to be neutered, plus food and hay. They’re far from a cheap and easy pet, but I knew I had to do the best by them.
So why do so many rabbits get such a rough deal? “Despite being the third most popular pet in the UK, they’re often seen as a ‘starter pet’,” says Lisa Whitty. “You get people dumping rabbits because they’ve decided to get a dog, or have a baby, or their child has lost interest. It’s just heartbreaking.”
So this Easter, stick to buying a chocolate bunny. For details, visit makeminechocolate.org.uk. For more information about the time and money needed to keep a pair of rabbits, happy and healthy visit rspca.org.uk/adviceandwelfare/pets/rabbits.