PRESENTATION FOR THE NANAIMO COUNCIL Monday, June 15, 2009

Mayor Ruttan and Councillors

I appreciate the opportunity to speak to the issue of the gassing of cats at our local pound. Nanaimo should be a leader in progressive shelter management programmes. Like most people I had no idea that Nanaimo was gassing cats.

I am disappointed at the way that this has been put on the agenda so quickly with no opportunity being given to the public to respond. Your staff’s work should be available to the public to study before a decision is made. I am very disappointed in the recommendations, which fly in the face of current animal welfare thinking.

Before voting to agree to gassing, please Google and use You Tube. Search for euthanasia and gas boxes and thousands of sites will come up. You can see for yourself what happens. Animals struggle and thrash around in a gas box before they are eventually asphyxiated.

Cathe Park, a friend of mine, cannot be here tonight as she is speaking at a meeting in Duncan about gassing. She worked at the Victoria pound for three years and part of her job was “tanking”, which was what the staff called putting animals in the gas box.

Here Cathe describes the death of a cat in a gas box:

From firsthand experience, I am about to describe the process of euthanizing a domestic or feral cat by Carbon Dioxide gassing.

“For the feral cat I will set a weight sensitive coon trap and wait until he enters and becomes snared. The domestic cat I merely place in a galvanized metal carrying crate. I make my way to the killing room. While I prepare the gas chamber I leave the cat and his crate uncovered on the floor or on top of the freezer.

Once I have filled the gas chamber with Carbon Dioxide I place him, crate and all, into the chamber, closing the plexiglas lid. He immediately starts gasping for air climbing as high as he can in the restricted space. I can only describe his writhing as panic. I press the release button to inject another burst of Carbon Dioxide. He reacts violently to the loud hissing noise. His mouth is gaping open; his tongue is reaching out trying to grab something. He is clawing at the sides of the cage to try and escape. Using his powerful hind legs, he tries to jump. In this abnormally small space, with only 3 inches of head room, he bashes against the top of the crate. He repeatedly leaps up in an attempt to gain an escape route. This continues for a few seconds. His hind leg pads and nails get stuck in the wires of the bottom of the cage. Violently struggling and thrashing about in an effort to get a breath of oxygen that will keep him alive, this instinctively clean animal now loses control of his bladder and bowels. In his subsequent writhing he will cover himself with his own feces and urine. Desperately trying to bite his way through the galvanized metal he clamps his teeth around the bars surrounding him. If he has any energy left within him he explosively vomits and begins to froth at the mouth, adding to the detritus he has previously expelled from his 10 pound body. Claws become dislodged adding blood to the mixture. Exhausted from the struggle to remain alive, his body sags and goes limp. He has passed out but his heart is still pumping the Carbon Dioxide rich blood through his veins and arteries. His teeth remain firmly clamped to the top of the cage. Death will not occur for a few more minutes, although his body appears lifeless. His body remains in the position it was in when he lost consciousness. We don't know for sure if he is dead yet, as in her efficiency the staff attendant has continued her daily routine while the cat slowly dies. Later, she will come to remove the body. It could be 10 minutes or an hour. Rigor mortis sets in quickly, within minutes of expiration. To remove him from the wire carrier, his jaw must be broken and several claws need to be pulled or cut off. Now he is put in an ordinary green garbage bag and put in the freezer awaiting removal to the landfill. The gas chamber, after a quick wipe down, is ready for use immediately.”

Gassing is not a quick and easy death. Euthanasia should be performed by a veterinarian. We should not have different rules for cats and dogs. Cats are not more expendable or any less capable of suffering than dogs are.

A recent study done at UBC’s Department of Animal Welfare describes the suffering of rodents when exposed to Carbon dioxide.

The conclusion of the study was that carbon dioxide "causes pain and distress and alternatives are urgently needed." This report was about rats, imagine how much worse it is for cats and larger animals than a rat.

Our pound has saved itself thousands of dollars by breaking the contract they signed with the city in 2005. I suspect that many councillors did not know that the terms were being broken. Residents certainly did not know. I had no idea despite having decades of experience in the animal welfare field.

I would hope that council will take what has transpired over the years very seriously. Dan Hughes has been flying under the radar and not acting in good faith in complying with the contract he signed. He knows that what he has been doing is breaching the contract, as is clearly evidenced by the recommendation now being put forward. The holders of the contract are deliberately choosing to use the gas box when there are better options available and they intend to continue to do so. When a new contract is awarded, I trust that Council will not endorse a policy of gassing cats. Council should hold Dan Hughes accountable for this breach of contract which was awarded to him in good faith by the Nanaimo Council.

The contract clearly states that the pound should

PROVIDE FOR EUTHANASIA BY MEANS OF LETHAL INJECTION, THE COST OF WHICH WILL BE BORNE BY THE CITY EXCEPT IN THE CASE OF INJURED ANIMALS WHERE AN OWNER IS IDENTIFIED.

The Nanaimo Pound should do exactly that- euthanize all cats and dogs, if euthanasia is necessary, by the method called for in the contract.

Eighteen states in the US have now banned the use of the gas box. They include big states like California, Arizona, New Jersey and Florida. Earlier this year New Mexico passed a bill, the latest state to ban its use. Locally New Westminster and the CDR Pound in Victoria have banned the gas box after a public outcry. In the Victoria the case was widely covered in the press and on television.

I read in the staff report that it costs $70 to kill all the cats for a year in a gas box and that it would cost $3225 annually to have a veterinarian do the job. I am sickened. We are talking life and death issues here, not dollars and cents. The $230 fee mentioned by your staff for euthanasia is nearly three times the fee suggested in the BC Veterinarian’s fee guide, so the pound can probably get a better rate. The cost is a minuscule part of the city budget. If money is an issue, I would be glad to pay the difference. Maybe Staff could clarify exactly how many cats were gassed last year.

The Canadian Veterinary Medical Association does not prefer gassing. I read from an e-mail from Dr. Skippon. In the CVMA’s euthanasia position Statement it says, “The CVMA considers IV barbiturate injection the most humane method of euthanasia.

The CVMA does also recognize that there are concerns surrounding the ability of some animal shelters to fund veterinary euthanasia using barbiturate injection (barbiturates are a controlled drug that must be administered by a veterinarian).”

Dr. Skippon’s concern about the possible lack of funds for barbiturate use does not apply in Nanaimo. There are many competent local veterinarians who would be able to go to the shelter and perform services in a professional, humane, gas-free manner. Taxpayers would not resent the small amount of extra money that they would pay. It’s a trivial amount compared to other funds dispersed by taxpayers.

The Humane Society of the United States, the largest animal welfare group in the U.S., totally opposes the use of carbon dioxide as a method of killing animals.

Carbon Dioxide (CO2)—CO2 is not acceptable for use in animal care and control facilities for the euthanasia of dogs and cats. CO2 produced from dry ice or generated from any other method is unacceptable.

Many other groups oppose the use of these gas boxes.

To summarize, I would like to oppose the idea of making gassing an acceptable option. When the contract comes up for renewal the terms must be perfectly clear and unequivocal. All dogs and cats in need of euthanasia must be killed by lethal injection.

Jean Martin,
Lantzville, BC