KSAC Public Health Department vs Corporate Area Dogs – 101 Dalmatians Kill and Kill Again

And in that town a dog was found,

As many dogs there be,

Both mongrel, puppy, whelp, and hound,

And curs of low Degree.

Goldsmith, Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog Tray

Looks like the long arm of the law has finally decided to get “ruff an’ tuff” with “stray dogs” that actually have owners. These owners may need to read Top 22 Tips on Keeping Your Small Dog Healthy on caring for their Dogs as they clearly are not doing a good job!

KSA (Kingston and St. Andrew) Public Health Department is advising Corporate area residents to reduce their dog population or face the legal action as stated in the article entitled “Dogs Gone Wild!Public-Health Inspectors Ordering Corporate Area Residents To Reduce The Number Of Animals At Their Homes”, published Sunday July 24, 2011 by Tyrone Reid, Sunday Gleaner Reporter, The Jamaica Gleaner.

As typical of the Local Government, their action is more reaction than preventative measures. This time the incident is another dog attack which occurred on to Monday July 18^th 2011AD in which a Mrs. Valerie Stephenson, a fifty eight (58) year old resident of March Pen Road, St. Catherine who was visiting her son-in-law at 7:00pm, was pounced upon by a Pit Bull. The lone assailant went for the jugular and death was swift as it was sure. Three (3) articles paint a gruesome picture of her last moments:

1. “March Pen Road woman mauled to death by pitbull”, published Tuesday July 19 2011 at 2:03pm, RJR News
2. “Woman mauled to death by pitbull”, published Wednesday July 20 2011, by RASBERT TURNER, STAR Writer, The Jamaica Star
3. “Pit bull kills old woman in Spanish Town”, published Wednesday, July 20, 2011, The Jamaica Observer

Needless to say, Jamaicans, numbed by recent beheadings [decapitations] and killings in the St. Catherine and St. Andrew Areas of Jamaica as stated in the article “5 Days, 4 Beheadings - Fourth decapitation in a week stuns nation”, published Sunday, July 24, 2011 BY COREY ROBINSON Sunday Observer staff reporter, The Jamaica Observer, were in a bit blasé in their reactions, chalking it up as just “a soh di tin set, star”!

But it can’t be back to business as usual, as a similar incident had occurred four (4) months prior with the killing of three year old Dmitri Thomas of Clinton Pen aka of Boat island in St Andrew in West Kingston, by a sextet (6) of Mongrel dogs at 12:30pm on Wednesday March 23^rd 2011 as per three (3) articles that paint a gruesome picture of his last moments:

1. “Team to go hunting for dogs that killed toddler”, published Thursday March 24, 2011 9:18am, RJR News
2. “Animal rights group fear more Dog attacks”, published 2011-03-24 17:25:47, by Livern Barrett, Gleaner Writer, Go-Jamaica.
3. “Dog Bites 3-y-o to Death”, published Wednesday March 23 2011 by Sheldon Williams and Sheldon Wright, STAR Writers, The Jamaica Star

Again the same M.O. (Modus operandii) in both cases; a dog attacking a human without provocation. If beheadings are bad enough, then attacks from Man’s best friend should make many worries, especially as many of these animals have owners, tantamount to manslaughter.

Especially disturbing is the fact that the KSA Public Health Department is finding evidence that suggest that the dogs in the Corporate Area aka the residences of The Young and the Restless (TV Series 1973– ) are actually being bred for sale! Not surprising, as I remember while living in Midland Drive, in a street across from Princeville Plaza along Constant Spring Road in Kingston and doing my Diploma in Electronics and Engineering at UTECH (1997 to 2000), that many residents had literally packs of dogs, which they appeared be breeding for resale.

Everton Baker, KSA Public Health Department Acting Chief Public-Health Inspector, in an interview with The Sunday Gleaner, made the same observation, quote: “People are seemingly doing it for commercial purposes ... but we can't prove it is commercial”. Everton Baker also went to point out some of the findings of the Health Inspectors, quote: “Some people will have all 10-15 dogs and the conditions are not conducive”, with unsanitary living conditions for the animals and little control over the animal’s ability to attack people.

However, it is the word of the KSA Public Health Department Acting Chief Public-Health Inspector Aubyn Killingbeck (Two actors? Wow!) that are a bit more interesting to statistics geeks such as your truly: most of the cases involve Mongrel dogs and most of them are feral [wild], quote: “A lot of the complaints that are coming in sometimes, are not about the Pedigrees”.

So the solution certainly fits the crime, as Corporate Area Residents aka The Young and the Restless (TV Series 1973– ) now not only have to cut down on the dogs found on their premises, but also possibly register, spay and neuter them to keep their population down.

But what of Mongrel dogs roaming free, whose population I will estimate is three (3) times that of the number of people in Jamaica, roughly two million, eight hundred thousand (2,800,000)? My blog article entitled “MRSI and Stray Dogs - Dr. Dolittle and The Golden Child” has solutions summarized neatly below:

1. Animal Registry where Mongrel Dogs are registered to owners using RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) as is the case in England as stated in the article “Crackdown on Dangerous Dogs to make microchips compulsory for all”, published Tuesday 9 March 2010, The Guardian
2. GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) tracking collars for the dogs in much the same way prisoners are currently being tracked by the Department of Correctional Services with the help of Dilieu Technology as stated in the article “Electronic tracking device for prison parolees, persons on bail”, published Sunday, November 13, 2005 BY LUKE DOUGLAS Sunday Observer writer, The Jamaica Observer.
3. Recapture the Mongrel [feral] dogs in the wild and have the Government of Jamaica use taxpayers dollars to spay and neuter these wild dogs to prevent them from breeding.
4. Laws be enforced to have dogs registered so as to treat all such dog bite incidents as cases of manslaughter, as the dogs, be they Pedigree or Mongrel, have owners. 

Capturing the feral Mongrel Dogs alive is thus priority with the Public Health Department teaming up with the dog experts at the JSPCA (Jamaica Society for Cruelty Against Animals). It will take years to capture and microchip them all! 

As the nature of this project is wide in scope and possibly require International help, it may actually provide a means of employment for unemployed Jamaicans in rounding up the dogs alive. This instead of killing them as has been the case with the above dog killings thus far, a political card again for Senator Pearnel Charles, Minister of Labour and Social Security, to play pre-2012AD General Elections.

Killing the Mongrel dogs makes the problem worse, as there may be unknown puppies in tow that, if unchecked, may grow to maturity and replace the current set of stray dogs, puppies who once recovered may be in need of adoption, like the lucky fellow below in the manicured hands of Carlette Deleon aka the Pet Tales Chick aka “Dilly” of Television Jamaica !

This action, best supervised by the JSPCA can also provide a source of material for a PhD Study by the Department of Biotechnology at the University of the West Indies on the Migratory Patterns of animals via the obtained tracking data, as Mongrel Dogs in the wild behave in much the same way as Wild Coyote or Wolves in the Appalachian Rockies

This need to be done before these 101 Dalmatians (1996) Kill and Kill Again (1981).