Volunteer at Animal Treatment Center in Kathmandu 


To achieve our objective of controlling the large dog population of Kathmandu, Nepal in a sustainable humane way, our programme urgently needs to be extended to other parts of the city.

 

With your help and co-operation, we can achieve our goals and make Kathmandu an animal friendly city – and the horrendous poisoning will be a thing of the past.

 

Situation of Stray dogs in Kathamndu:

There are more than 20,000 street dogs in urban Kathmandu, Nepal. They are commonly afflicted with injuries from collisions with cars, starvation, open sores with maggot infections, severe skin problems, grotesque tumours, and infectious ailments.


Some stray dogs in Nepal carry rabies and other dangerous diseases which can put people, especially children who often play in the streets, at risk. Every year, around 200 people in Nepal die of rabies (most of whom are children), and 16 000 are treated for dog bites.


The Kathmandu city government used to poison more than 10 000 street dogs each year with strychnine, in an attempt to control the street dog population. This is a horrific form of death, throwing the dogs into violent seizures for up to nine hours before they die. The poison is scattered on the streets in lumps of meat, where it is a danger to children (who often play in the streets) and people's pets.

 

The dog carcasses are dumped in piles and left to decompose in the river beds. As many Kathmandu residents depend on the river for their drinking water, this creates a serious health hazard. Furthermore, this method is ineffective because the remaining dogs breed and the dog population returns to its original size within a year.

 

Volunteer: Come to  Kathmandu, Nepal and improve the lives of street dogs! You can help in a wide variety of ways. We are in need of veterinarians, vet students, and vet techs/nurses, as well as non-technical volunteers.