Hong Kong is seeing an increase in abandoned pets. Most animal shelters are always a full house.
Why are Hong Kong residents letting go of their pets?
According to government data, around 200,000 residents left Hong Kong between 2020 and 2022.
This is due to China’s crackdown on dissent and Covid restrictions.
Almost all other parts of the world have opened up.
They are learning to live with Covid with precautions and vaccinations. But Hong Kong continues to follow a lighter version of China’s strict zero-Covid rules.
People travelling abroad or leaving the country usually take their pets with them. But the strict pandemic restrictions in Hong Kong make that difficult.
With thousands of people getting out of the country, there are fewer commercial flight vacancies and the space for pets is much less.
So, taking pets along is either more expensive or impossible.
Some pet owners have even clubbed together to rent private planes to get animals out.
The animal shelter workers say that the pet owners who leave their pets behind move on in a month or two, but the pets don’t.
Even though the shelters are in maximum capacity, they always try to take in the pets they get.
They say that they find it very difficult to say no to surrender requests because they feel very bad for the pets.
