Author: SG Volunteer Team

Meet Prince, a male dog that was on the brink of death but is now slowly recovering.

The story of the 5-year-old canine – believed to be a poodle – began when on 16 April an unidentified breeder left it at Pet Clinic in Serangoon to be put down..

At the time the dog was a lifeless, emaciated bag of bones that weighed a 2.4 kilos. A normal healthy dog his age weighs four to five kilos.

He was eventually rescued when a customer at the clinic saw Prince – who was then too weak to even walk or eat properly — and contacted HOPE Dog Rescue, a group of volunteer animal rescuers that has been around since 2011.

The organisation helped take daily care of Prince at the clinic at Mount Pleasant Veterinary Centre.

Fiona Foo, founder of HOPE, said that when she first saw Prince, it “looked like a frozen chicken from the supermarket.”

Subsequent checks by veterinarians revealed that besides being under-nourished and possibly physically abused, Prince was also suffering from a litany of health ailments: kidney and liver failure, tick fever and autoimmune problems. He was also severely anaemic and needed a blood transfusion.

Prince was taken home last Saturday by fosterer, Soh. The 41-year-old secretary is now helping to take care of the dog until it gets healthy and can be re-homed.

The first night Prince stayed at Soh’s house, it was so sick and afraid that it could not walk or move out of a mat Soh laid out for it in her kitchen.

“When I called Prince, he lifted one leg up and wanted to come out of the mat but he stopped for a second and drew his leg back in. Perhaps in the past, he had been scolded or beaten for stepping out of his area,” said Soh.

Soh said in order to help him sleep lying down, she had to wrap him up like a baby and flip him down on his bed. She suspects that Prince cannot sleep lying down because he had been kept in a tiny cage that didn’t allow him to move much, let alone sleep properly. To make matters worse, Prince has developed pressure sores on his bum from sitting down for long periods.

Previously, Prince would sleep sitting up and nod to sleep. To make it easier for him to sleep, volunteers would stack a tower of towels to support his head from nodding. “He’s very weak and not recovering fast enough because he doesn’t get enough sleep,” said Foo.

“Someone has to stay with him and the minute we move our hands, he’ll stand up in attention again because that’s how he’s been sleeping all his life,” added Soh.

But it seems the care and attention has been working. Prince is now able to walk and run slowly, and even barked on Tuesday.

The plight of abandoned dogs

HOPE says Prince is just one of thousands of dogs raised by dog breeders for commercial sale. In the past year, the volunteer outfit has rescued about 10 to 15 dogs, mostly less than a year old, who have been ill-treated at puppy farms.

“These young puppies often have rotten teeth, major skin problems but are very, very sweet because all they crave for is love and attention because no one has ever cared about them,” said Foo.

Big puppy farms usually have about 400-500 dogs while smaller ones have about 100-200. There are also home breeders who breed dogs at home and often sell the puppies online.

“When you take [the puppy] home, within the next few weeks or months, they develop pneumonia, kennel cough, skin problems and that’s when a whole lifetime of problems start,” said Foo.

“Because their parents are like that and live in terrible conditions, how much healthier do you think the puppy is?” she added.

When the “parent” dogs no longer have commercial value, breeders will either throw them away, put them down or abandon them.

“Having made tens of thousands of dollars for you, the least you could do is to find them a home,” said Foo.

“What if we never found them? They’ll just die a slow death in these puppy mills,” she added.

TIMELINE

April 16 – Unidentified breeder sends Prince to the vet to be put down

April 18 – HOPE took over Prince from another dog owner who has been caring for Prince

April 21 – Warded at hospital at Mount Pleasant Veterinary Centre

April 28 – Discharged from hospital

April 28 – Went to fosterer Karen’s home. Prince walks and runs around now but is still suffering from other illnesses.

This article was first published in Yahoo!

The Community Chest aims to raise a record $72.3 million in the current financial year.

It plans to use the 30 percent increase in funds to better help families, youths-at-risk and the disabled.

Despite being diagnosed with mild intellectual disability, 21-year-old Ong Kian Peng successfully completed his vocational training in the food and beverage industry.

He earned the Singapore Workforce Skills Qualifications Certificate in Food and Beverage Service.

Kian Peng has been working as a service crew at a fast-food outlet for more than a year. And his good performance has landed him a permanent job with the company.

“I can meet new friends, and I can learn new skills, and I can earn a lot of salary,” he said.

ComChest aims to reach out to more people like Kian Peng by increasing its fund-raising target by $16.6 million.

The money will help 82 voluntary welfare organisations provide 219 social service programmes that will benefit over 300,000 people.

The newly-funded programmes will meet service gaps and cater to a growing demand for services.

More than half of the funds will go towards helping children with special needs. These include setting up three centres for the Early Intervention Programme for Infants and Children.

Jennie Chua, Chairman of Community Chest, said: “If children are born with special needs and you intervene and have programmes to intervene early, it will be effective. And in fact you do save a lot of money later on.) So if you have got the evidence that this is good for children with special needs, you need to put more money there.”

Funds will be disbursed to enhance curriculum and increase enrolment at special education schools, as well as to serve 500 more adults with disabilities and their families.

Abhimanyau, Society for the Physically Disabled, said: “Every single dollar that we raised or get government fund, we are trying to allocate 80 percent directly to the children. That means 80 percent will be used for service provision, 20 percent for administrative work.

ComChest will also co-fund the STEP-UP programme (Enhanced ‘School Social Work to Empower Pupils to Utilise Their Potential’) together with the Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports.

It aims to support youths-at-risk in completing their education.

The funds will also be used to build three more family service centres to serve 600 more families.

This article was first published in CNA

Do not release animals into the wild this Vesak Day — that’s a reminder from the National Parks Board (NParks).

This year’s Vesak Day falls on Saturday.

NParks said it is working with volunteers to carry out “Operation No Release” in the nature reserves and reservoirs this weekend.

They will keep a lookout for any case of animal release and will educate and advise members of the public on the harm of releasing animals into the wild.

NParks director of conservation Wong Tuan Wah said: “We would like to appeal to the public not to release animals into the wild as it means sending them to their deaths.

“As some of these animals are usually kept as pets, they are not likely to survive as they are not used to the surroundings and are not able to cope in the wild. If these animals carry viruses, they will also affect other native wildlife.”

Meanwhile, Buddhist Fellowship president Angie Chew Monksfield said: “We should be compassionate and considerate to animals both in captivity as well as in the wild as releasing certain animals could threaten those in the wild.

“It would be more beneficial to reduce our meat intake all year round than simply releasing animals during Vesak as this could also encourage vendors to increase the supply of animals for this very purpose.”

To complement efforts of the operation, NParks is partnering volunteers and students from CHIJ Our Lady Queen of Peace to conduct an outreach ambassador session at the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve on 19 May, from 9am to noon.

The session aims to educate and advise the public against releasing animals into Singapore’s reserves and nature areas.

This article was first published in CNA