DR. FOX: I’m 87, and have always declawed my indoor cats on their front paws with no problems. Last year, I got two ginger kittens. Before I could declaw them, they scratched my foot and I ended up in the hospital with cellulitis. After that, they were laser-declawed in the morning and were home tramping around in the afternoon.

The protection of babies, the elderly and furniture require front-declawing. The alternative is euthanizing the cats. Another option is euthanizing any vet who opposes declawing. You’re a jerk! -- L.O., Marco Island, Florida

DEAR L.O.: I am tired of responding to readers such as you, so I referred your letter to veterinarian Dr. Ron Gaskin of Shakopee, Minnesota. He has done remarkable reconstructive surgery on many cats crippled by this surgical mutilation.

Gaskin writes:

"It was shocking to read the statement that to protect humans and furniture, front-declawing cats is 'required'! Perhaps much more thought should have been given to the needs of these kittens rather than the wants of the owners. Bringing kittens into a home with elders who are not willing or able to create a feline-appropriate, safe and compassionate environment for them is inexcusable.

"Kittens have not yet had a chance to learn about boundaries. Amputating their toes for human convenience, rather than clipping their nails and providing them with suitable scratching posts, is inhumane.

"Millions of people worldwide live happily with cats whom they choose to respect and not harm. Many countries prohibit declawing, considering it cruel and unethical. At its very core, declawing inevitably changes the mechanics of cats’ paws, balance and how they walk, which in and of itself is medically unjustifiable and ethically indefensible.

"As to the comment about vets, we have sworn an oath to prevent and relieve animal suffering. Performing a painful elective procedure that provides no medical benefit to the cat, for the sole convenience of the owner, inflicts suffering rather than preventing it, and therefore violates our oath.”

DR. FOX HERE: I would add that the elderly should consider the probability of any adopted animals outliving them. Either make appropriate provisions for these animals, or instead of adopting a pet, engage in foster care for an animal shelter. Animals can thus be rehabilitated for adoption by younger people.

For more about declawing, see my post here: drfoxonehealth.com/post/declawing-cats.

GOOD NEWS FOR RED WOLVES

Three red wolf pups were born at the Museum of Life and Science in Durham, North Carolina. This marks another milestone in conservation efforts for the critically endangered species, which has about 20 members in the wild and 300 under human care. (Full story: The News & Observer, May 13)

This is a glimmer of hope, brought about through the dedication of many people, for an American wolf species on the verge of extinction.

(Send all mail to animaldocfox@gmail.com or to Dr. Michael Fox in care of Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106. The volume of mail received prohibits personal replies, but questions and comments of general interest will be discussed in future columns.

Visit Dr. Fox’s website at DrFoxOneHealth.com.)

DEAR READERS: If we humans had respected water as Mother Earth’s lifeblood, plants as her lungs, animals as her children and air as our shared spirit, perhaps the Industrial Revolution would have made a better, safer world than we have today.

The Industrial Revolution has led to the creation of the technosphere, of which chemical and electropollution are harmful byproducts. These ill effects must be contained and transformed to prevent the globalization of bio-industrialized wastelands, like industrial agriculture’s millions of pesticide- and herbicide-poisoned acres, filled with genetically engineered crops.

The technosphere’s escalating energy demands -- for its ever-proliferating data centers, cybercurrency mining and transactions, and other services -- need to be tempered to reduce the severity of climate change and our exposure to associated electropollution.

For more than a decade, several authors have documented the validity of concerns over the issues of electropollution and exposure to electromagnetic fields and nonionizing radiation. Notably, physician Samuel Milham warns that because of the recent proliferation of radio frequency radiation -- from cellphones, cell towers, terrestrial antennas, Wi-Fi systems, broadband internet over power lines and other electronic equipment -- we may be facing a looming epidemic of morbidity and mortality. In his 2012 book, “Dirty Electricity,” he reveals the steps we must take, personally and as a society, to coexist with this marvelous but dangerous technology. (See also “An Electronic Silent Spring” by Katie Singer and “The Invisible Rainbow” by Arthur Firstenberg.)

In the last decade, a plethora of scientific studies have been published that support the concerns of these authors and other informed parties. From a One Health perspective, we have created a technosphere that is damaging the biosphere at many levels. It is an existential challenge to rectify this imbalance so that we can live in greater harmony with other sentient beings and achieve better health and quality of life.

BOOK REVIEW: 'OUT OF SIGHT' BY GAIL A. EISNITZ

“Out of Sight: An Undercover Investigator’s Fight for Animal Rights and Her Own Survival” is a memoir by Gail Eisnitz, chief investigator for the Humane Farming Association and recipient of the Albert Schweitzer Medal for her work on behalf of animals. Her earlier book, “Slaughterhouse: The Shocking Story of Greed, Neglect and Inhumane Treatment Inside the U.S. Meat Industry,” documented how the billions of animals that people eat are routinely mistreated and slaughtered.

The Humane Slaughter Act requires that all farm animals, except poultry, be humanely handled and rendered unconscious before being butchered. In spite of the law, farmed animals across the U.S. had no effective protection from inhumane handling and slaughter; many were being skinned and scaled alive until Eisnitz reported her findings to the media, the courts and her readers.

All who care about animals, and for the poor people (many of them immigrants) who work in animal slaughterhouses, should read Eisnitz’s work. I have visited factory farms and slaughterhouses in several countries, rich and poor, and can attest to the interminable suffering of animals raised and killed for human consumption. As Eisnitz concludes in her just-released memoir, spot checks in the U.S. only catch violators when inspectors are present.

Compounding that problem, in March, the Trump administration announced that it is starting the process of lifting the cap on slaughterhouse production line speeds. The cap is currently set at the meteoric rate of 1,106 hogs per slaughter line per hour -- roughly one hog slaughtered every four seconds. Soon, some slaughterhouses may be free to kill hogs as quickly and recklessly as they want. For poultry, who have no protections under the HSA and are often immersed in scalding tanks alive, the administration is seeking to increase evisceration line speeds from 140 birds per minute to 175 per minute. This poses a threat not only to the workers, who suffer from repetitive motion injuries, but to the animals themselves.

Farm animal welfare deficits need to be rectified, especially for mother pigs confined to narrow crates their entire lives (a practice being phased out in the U.K.), and laying hens crowded into small cages in factory farms. Dairy cows and beef cattle need better protection from extreme weather events in outdoor feedlots.

Transportation of these animals to slaughter is another issue. Shipping many animals together saves money, which means that when overcrowding, trampling, suffocation and death from extreme cold and heat occur, such losses are written off as a business expense.

Animals suffer a great deal on the way to America’s dinner tables. Arm yourself with the facts and get a copy of “Out of Sight.”

(Send all mail to animaldocfox@gmail.com or to Dr. Michael Fox in care of Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106. The volume of mail received prohibits personal replies, but questions and comments of general interest will be discussed in future columns.

Visit Dr. Fox’s website at DrFoxOneHealth.com.)

DEAR DR. FOX: I watched Dr. Sanjay Gupta’s “Animal Pharm” documentary on CNN on May 18 about genetically engineering and cloning pigs to be organ donors for people needing a new heart, liver or kidney. I wonder: What is your response to this amazing science of biotechnology? -- B.K., Washington, D.C.

DEAR B.K.: I wrote about this technology, called xenotransplantation, in my 2004 book, “Killer Foods: When Scientists Manipulate Genes, Better is Not Always Best.” I detailed the risks of swine viruses being transmitted to humans receiving pig organs, which was also mentioned in the CNN program. I also noted that in the U.S. and the U.K., “this research continues and entails much suffering for monkeys, who are used as test recipients for pig hearts and kidneys.”

I watched Dr. Gupta’s excellent coverage of this issue, which noted it will be some five years before there is a reliable supply of pig organs. However, there were no details about costs. The ethical cost is certainly high, in terms of paving the way for yet another form of animal exploitation. These concerns were mollified by the recipient of a pig’s kidney, who is Catholic and said he had received a letter from the Vatican stating, “God put animals on Earth to serve us.”

Several years ago, I wrote to the Vatican to ask where in the Bible there was any support for what Pope John Paul II declared in an address to veterinarians: that “it is certain that animals were created for man’s use.” The response I received was that a pope’s statements are infallible -- direct from God. That is not my God! I embrace the view of the 14th-century Christian theologian Meister Eckhart, who declared, “Every creature is a word of God.”

For many people, it is through animals and nature that God, or a higher power, speaks to them. To not feel this connection is to live in the absence of the sacred, opening the door to inhumanity. This insensitivity, which I call the empathy deficit disorder, led to the extinction of the passenger pigeon and near-extermination of the bison.

GENE-ENGINEERED PIGS APPROVED FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION

The Food and Drug Administration has approved CRISPR gene-edited pigs for consumption in the U.S. The pigs have been engineered by British company Genus to resist the virus that causes porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome, or PRRS, which thrives in overcrowded factory farms and kills piglets in the womb.

More details, as reported by MIT Technology Review (technologyreview.com):

"According to Matt Culbertson, chief operating officer of the Pig Improvement Company, a Genus subsidiary, the pigs appear entirely immune to more than 99% of the known versions of the PRRS virus, although there is one rare subtype that may break through the protection. ...

"Culbertson says gene-edited pork could appear in the U.S. market sometime next year. He says the company does not think pork chops or other meat will need to carry any label identifying it as bioengineered. 'We aren’t aware of any labeling requirement,' he says." (Full story: MIT Technology Review, May 2)

Regardless of any consumer safety issues, this does not change the stressful, overcrowded conditions under which pigs are kept in factory farms and CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations) around the world. Keeping dogs under such conditions would be prosecuted on the grounds of animal cruelty. CAFOs have virtually no biosecurity, and are a potential public health risk from viruses and bacteria that can spread to humans.

Over 125 million pigs are consumed annually by Americans. There are only an estimated 20 million vegetarians in the country, or 6% of the population. If Robert F. Kennedy Jr. truly wants to "Make America Healthy Again," he must address the overconsumption of meat. It poses many environmental and public health risks and also facilitates animal suffering, as documented in my book “One Health: Veterinary, Ethical and Environmental Perspectives” -- a copy of which I sent to Kennedy.

(Send all mail to animaldocfox@gmail.com or to Dr. Michael Fox in care of Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106. The volume of mail received prohibits personal replies, but questions and comments of general interest will be discussed in future columns.

Visit Dr. Fox’s website at DrFoxOneHealth.com.)