Lincolnshire charity heading to China to help disabled dogs rescued from meat trade
Broken Biscuits team will take specialist equipment and training to shelter caring for dogs saved from the industry
A Lincoln charity is travelling to China on Sunday 15 March to help disabled dogs rescued from the meat trade.
Broken Biscuits, a vet-led organisation that supports families caring for disabled pets, will spend two weeks working with a shelter caring for animals saved from the industry in Harbin.
The team will take mobility equipment, including dog wheelchairs, and share specialist knowledge with local vets and volunteers to help injured animals recover and improve their chances of adoption.
The charity’s co-founder, Tim Giles, says their work originally started in Lincolnshire after realising how little support there was for disabled pets and their owners.
"Unfortunately, that often meant that the dogs were never given the chance, " said Tim.
"Their families weren't aware of the simple modifications to make to their lives to keep them together."
The trip came about after the charity began supporting UK families who had adopted rescue dogs from overseas, including animals saved from China’s meat trade.
Through those cases, they realised some dogs were arriving in Britain with conditions that could have been treated earlier.
"We realised that some of the dogs were coming over with conditions that were quite expensive to treat in the UK, could have been treated quite quickly at source" said Tim
“A lot of them are having disabilities that in the UK could be quite easily treated.”
Alongside two leading UK orthopaedic vets, the team will provide training and advice while fitting mobility equipment for dogs at the shelter.
“We’re going over there taking wheelchairs and mobility equipment so that we can actually help fit them to the dogs over there,” he said.
“So some of the disabled dogs in their shelter can get mobile again, which helps their chances of rehab, but also their chances of getting adopted.”
The team also plans to bring some dogs back to the UK for specialist treatment and rehabilitation before they are fostered or adopted into new homes.
“When we leave, we’ll hopefully leave some sort of a lasting legacy there in terms of benefits going forward.”