Animal cruelty has been in the world since the neolithic revolution. In today’s modern era, the United States of America has one of the highest animal cruelty rates versus other modern countries, with having to euthanize 2.7 million animals yearly against countries like Australia, who euthanized 40,296 animals in the 22014-2015 year (Pet Statistics and Published Statistics). Animal cruelty is on the rise not only in the United States, but around the world.
Animal cruelty and abandonment has been on the rise in the US. Nationally there are 7.6 million animals enter United States shelters every year; of those 3.9 million are dogs and 3.4 million are cats (Pet Statistics). With so many animals going into the shelter system, only 649,000 animals are returned to their owners, 542,000 dogs and only 100,000 cats (Pet Statistics). It seems that cats are the least likely to be returned to their owners with “less than 5% of cats who came in as strays are returned to their owners” (Pet Statistics). With the growing abandonment in the US, …show more content…
The current maximum penalty for animal cruelty in Canada os six months in jail with a fine of $2,000, and a ban stating that the person can not owned another pet for two years (News, CBC). Many people in Canada have been calling for harsher punishments like a lifetime ban on owning a pet for those convicted of an offence against an animal. One of those people is Martin Cole of the Ontario Humane Society (News, CBC). A man by the name of Ottawa is working on a new law on animal cruelty, but it's not known when the legislation might be tabled (News, CBC). The Canadian Justice Department has even been working with different animal groups to consult on how to prevent animal abuse that "overwhelmingly favored the toughening of sentences for those who abuse animals" (News,