Photo: Many home insurance companies embrace cruel and discriminatory “breed” exclusion policies — policies that can mean a dog loses his home or misses out on an adoption.

A study finds that sterilizing community dogs actually encourages kindness toward street dogs as caretakers provide positive role models for others to emulate. The City of St. Paul, MN, has agreed to pay $70,000 to a family whose two dogs were shot and killed by police officers in front of their children. A timeline of reform in Hamilton Township, NJ. Eliminating housing discrimination for people whose families include a dog, cat, or other animal companion would allow 8.75 million animals to find new homes. Many home insurance companies have breed discriminatory policies, but they won’t tell you about it. The number of communities placing over 95% and as high as 99% of the animals is increasing. And a new study proves that cats are highly resistant to COVID-19 and do not transmit it to other cats outside or in shelters.

In case you missed it:

A study finds that sterilizing community dogs actually encourages kindness toward street dogs as caretakers provide positive role models for others to emulate. The City of St. Paul, MN, has agreed to pay $70,000 to a family whose two dogs were shot and killed by police officers in front of their children. First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win: A timeline of reform in Hamilton Township, NJ. Eliminating housing discrimination for people whose families include a dog, cat, or other animal companion would allow 8.75 million animals to find new homes, roughly six years worth of killing in U.S. pounds. Many home insurance companies have breed discriminatory policies, but they won’t tell you about it. According to an an analysis by Forbes Advisor, the list of banned dog breeds “are often hidden from consumers’ view in filings made by insurers to state insurance departments.”

The number of communities placing over 95% and as high as 99% of the animals is increasing:

Avery County, NC, reported a 97% placement rate for dogs, 97% for cats, and 100% for rabbits and other small animals. Fairfax County, VA, reported a 95% placement rate for rabbits, gerbils, and other small animals, but only 91% for dogs and 91% for cats.

These shelters and the data nationally prove that animals are NOT dying in pounds because there are too many or too few homes or people don’t want the animals. They are dying because people in those pounds are killing them. Replace those people, implement the No Kill Equation, and we can be a No Kill nation today.

And finally, a peer-reviewed study of community and shelter cats found no cat-to-cat transmission of SARS-Cov-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The study was conducted in the Lombardy region of northern Italy, which is significant for two reasons. First, Lombardy was “one of the worst affected Italian regions” with over half a million cases. Second, since community cat programs are government recognized and fairly extensive, all the community cats tested for SARS-CoV-2 had negative baselines prior to the pandemic. In other words, before the pandemic, all cats tested negative for antibodies. And of the hundreds of samples tested afterward, only one cat “was positive for antibodies” (but tested negative for an active infection). The cat posed no risk to any other cat, did not transmit it to other cats despite being a member of a cat colony, and was almost certainly initially infected by a COVID-19 positive caretaker, not another cat. The same findings applied to shelter-tested cats. As a result, the study authors conclude that “there is no indication of SARS-CoV-2 circulating in stray cats.” Combined with similar results in shelter-tested cats and those who live in human homes, cats are not a source of infection for people or other animals. And that, say study authors, “should alleviate public concerns about stray cats acting as SARS-CoV-2 carriers.”

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