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The world has changed, we’ve changed and animals need us more than ever. Our lives have been deeply affected, with social habits upended, public health compromised, and world economies brought to a screeching halt. Receiving far less attention is the effect the pandemic has had on companion animals, especially those without an owner but also on pet owners struggling financially during this time.
As federal, state and local governments worked to identify and support essential services, it became clear we needed to advocate for pets and the essential services that support them (e.g., animal shelters, animal control and veterinarians). It was critical that animal welfare would not be compromised and that these essential services remained open so they could continue to serve the public health and safety needs. During these efforts, every day heroes emerged in shelter workers, veterinary care professionals, animal control officers and others who put themselves on the front line every day and proved themselves essential workers in our community.
Equally important was the need for formal communications to the general public, with accurate, factual and reliable information on companion animals and COVID-19. Animal shelters have been challenged with balancing animal care and community demands with public health and safety and have had to create best practices and animal control protocols so that false perceptions and lack of reliable information did not result in more pets being surrendered to shelters.
When people began losing their jobs in March and it became harder for people to care for their pets, the priority was to provide them with food donations to ensure pet owners didn’t have the make the hard decision to surrender their pets. Friends of Miami Animals Foundation (“FoMA”) was early to address these needs and helped fund nearly 1,500 pounds of free pet food through Miami Dade Animal Services (“MDAS”) sponsored food distribution efforts that have delivered nearly 20,000 pounds of food to date to pet owners.
One pleasant surprise during the pandemic has been the community’s interest in fostering shelter pets. Shelters have reported record low occupancy during the pandemic due to their outreach in the community and every day heroes who were willing to take shelter pets into their homes temporarily. To support these fosters, FoMA moved quickly to provide supplies needed for pets going into temporary homes and in just a few weeks, over 250 pets went into foster homes and almost 300 were adopted.
FoMA also helped initiate, with MDAS, weekly Facebook Live virtual adoption events to continue to share shelter pets with potential adopters as social distancing, limits on gatherings and other restrictions made it difficult for adopters to visit shelters.
Yet, in many ways and despite all we’ve done, those of us working in animal welfare know that we are treading water. As the pandemic alters the way we live and conduct business, needs will grow, especially when unemployment benefit needs increase and eviction and other protections expire; and with that the needs of pets will also grow.
At Friends of Miami Animals Foundation we are committed to continuing to do our part & continue to help our community’s pets and to support those on the front line: veterinary care professionals, shelter workers, fosters, adopters and pet owners and to continue to innovate and support life saving efforts in Miami-Dade County.
Yolanda Berkowitz, President of Friends of Miami Animals
Foundation, Inc.,501(c)3 Non Profit Organization.
305-854-2800 Facebook: facebook.com/yolanda.berkowitz
Instagram: @mrsyobe. @rescuedogsrockmia. @friendsofmiamianimals.com
www.fomapets.org
