ALBERT

Description: Due to their professional abilities, veterinarians have a duty to reduce animal abuse. Therefore, it is crucial to understand their attitude and behavior on encountering animal abuse cases. We analyzed the responses from completed questionnaires (n = 593) filled by small and large animal practitioners in South Korea. The majority (n = 513, 86.5%) of the respondents witnessed suspected animal abuse cases in their practice. The female participants, small animal practitioners, and younger veterinarians tended to report animal abuse cases more frequently. Based on a hierarchical regression model, moral obligation was the statistically significant predictor of intention toward counseling owners (F = 22.089, R2 = 0.232, p 〈 0.001) while “pro-animal” attitudes, belief in the “link” between animal and human crimes, and moral and legal obligation were significant predictors of intention to report (F = 22.877, R2 = 0.239, p 〈 0.001). The most frequent barrier in reporting abuse cases was the difficulty in assuring animal safety afterwards. Our findings revealed that individual characteristics (sex, age, practice type, pro-animal attitude) affect veterinarian sensitivity in recognizing animal abuse. Participants lacked self-efficiency in managing animal abuse cases. Therefore, strengthening professionalism and training veterinarians in identifying nonaccidental injuries caused by abuse are recommended to motivate them to intervene in abuse cases.

Description: The last decade brought several devastating outbreaks of foot and mouth disease and avian influenza in South Korea, which had been handled through preventive culling, despite the controversy surrounding its efficiency and ethical considerations. Notably, the lack of regulations on culling processes has exposed the workers to extremely harsh working conditions. This study investigates the effect of culling jobs on the mental health of the frontline workers, based on 200 samples collected through a web-based survey conducted on participants with experience of culling tasks. Culling was found to have a powerful negative effect on the workers’ mental health, including high depression rates. Of those surveyed, 83.7% answered that the working conditions were intense, and 74.5% showed scores above the cutoff point for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). A regression analysis revealed that individual’s attitudes toward animals mediated the effect of culling experience on PTSD symptoms. However, mental health care for the workers has been insufficient: 70.2% of the respondents were willing to get mental treatment to deal with the distress they underwent from culling. We conclude that engagement in culling has a detrimental effect on the workers’ mental health, and that they should be provided with systematic mental health care.

Description: Background Supplemental feeding of free-roaming animals, including wildlife and feral or stray animals, is well known to have a substantial impact on various aspects of animal ecology including habitat use, activity patterns, and host-pathogen interactions. Among them, an increased population density (PD) of animals receiving supplemental food raises concerns regarding the transmission of pathogens in these host populations. The primary aim of this study was to investigate how supplemental feeding is associated with host PD and prevalence of pathogens with different transmission modes in urban stray cats. We hypothesized that supplemental feeding would be positively associated with host PD and the prevalence of pathogens with density-dependent transmission modes compared with pathogens with transmission modes that are considered relatively density-independent. Methods This study was conducted in six districts in Seoul, Republic of Korea which were selected based on different degrees of supplemental feeding and cat caretaker activity (CCA). The PD of stray cats was estimated by mark-recapture surveys. Stray cat blood samples (N = 302) were collected from stray cats by local animal hospitals from each district performing the trap-neuter-release which tested for eight pathogens with different transmission modes (feline immunodeficiency virus, feline leukemia virus (FeLV), feline panleukopenia virus, feline calicivirus, feline herpesvirus-1, Bartonella henselae, hemoplasma, and Toxoplasma gondii) with molecular or serological assays. Associations between the prevalence of each pathogen and PD, CCA, and sex of cats were statistically analyzed. Results In contrast to initial predictions, the cat PD was generally higher in low CCA districts. The prevalence of (FeLV), which is transmitted through direct contact, was significantly higher in areas with a high CCA, conforming to our hypothesis. On the other hand, the prevalence of feline parvovirus, which can be spread by environmental transmission, was higher in low CCA districts. The remaining six pathogens did not show any association with the CCA; however, they had a unique association with the PD or the sex of the stray cats. Discussion Our findings suggest that in addition to influencing the PD, supplemental feeding may affect the prevalence of pathogens in urban animals by mechanisms such as increased aggregation and/or altered foraging strategies, with different consequences depending on the transmission mode of each pathogen.