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Animal Care on Wheels

Three mobile clinic vans take treatment, medication and vaccination to stray animals in their own streets — so care arrives on the day it is needed, and no frightened animal has to be carried across the city first.

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A tagged street dog held gently by a gloved hand during a check-up — A treated stray, tagged and recorded

Overview

Treatment that travels to the animal

Ahmedabad's streets carry a large population of stray and abandoned animals. They are hurt in road accidents, injured by human cruelty, and fall ill with seasonal and zoonotic disease. Because nobody owns them, most are never seen by a veterinarian at all — and many die of injuries that could have been treated.

Jivdaya runs three mobile clinic vans so that the treatment goes to them instead. A van reaches the animal in its own locality, where it is calm and knows its surroundings, and the treatment, medication and vaccination all happen there. Recovery is quicker, and far less frightening, than a journey to a hospital would be.

80,000+
Strays treated across Ahmedabad: 3
Mobile clinic vans on the road: 2,364
Treatments in January 2020

Challenge and solution

Why the vans exist, and what they carry

The challenge

Heavy urbanisation and deforestation have taken away natural habitat, leaving many animals stray in the city.
Those strays live with the consequences of human indifference, and suffer for it.
Some are victims of deliberate cruelty, which leaves permanent injury or kills them.
Seasonal and zoonotic disease — influenza, tuberculosis, rabies, anthrax, canine distemper — moves through an untreated street population and ends lives.

What the vans do

Injured and diseased animals get prompt, timely treatment rather than waiting for someone to bring them in.
Care is given in the animal's own area, so recovery is speedy and stress-free.
Every van is equipped with proper medical instruments, an expert veterinarian and an experienced veterinary assistant.
Animals are vaccinated as well as treated, against rabies, anthrax and other zoonotic disease.

A Jivdaya veterinarian in blue scrubs holding a puppy steady on an examination table — A puppy examined after being brought in

Long-term impact

Toward a city free of rabies

The project sets out to improve the wellbeing of Ahmedabad's strays and, in time, to free the city of rabies and other zoonotic disease — which also removes the risk of those diseases spreading through human households. Then people and animals can live alongside each other in peace.

A healthy dog is the best friend of a human.

— Jivdaya Charitable Trust, on this project

Reports

Monthly treatment summary — January 2020

Treatments by van

Van A1: 475
Van A2: 471
Van A3: 1,418
Total: 2,364

Figures as published by the trust for January 2020. The two tables count different things and do not sum to the same total.

Animals treated, by species

Dogs: 1,449
Cats: 305
Goats: 32
Cows: 17
Monkeys: 6
Horses: 4
Rabbits: 3
Buffalo: 2
Bull: 1
Hamster: 1
Total: 1,820

Reports

From the vans

Case notes the trust published from this project in February 2020.

The puppy, examined after the band was cut away
26 February 2020
Puppy suffered a deep wound
Choking is a hazard for a puppy, and being choked slowly is worse. If it happened to us, our first reaction would be to scream for help — but when the cruelty is done to an animal, there is nobody for it to call. One such case came to Jivdaya in the form of a small puppy with a deep wound and unbearable pain from a plastic band tied around its neck. The animal care on wheels team rescued him and brought him in for emergency treatment. The vets began at once, and after a week of regular medication, a high-protein diet and care, he is in safe hands and on the road to recovery.
A van treating a dog in its own locality
22 February 2020
Parvo is a preventable disease
Parvovirus is seasonal in dogs, and this season the mobile clinic vans were reaching 30 to 35 cases a day in the animals' own localities. Canine parvovirus is highly contagious and spreads rapidly among puppies, adolescent dogs and any dog that has not been vaccinated. It severely affects the intestinal tract and the white blood cells, and in a young animal it can damage the heart muscle and leave a lifelong cardiac problem, or prove fatal. The signs are lethargy, severe vomiting, loss of appetite, and bloody, foul-smelling diarrhoea that leads to life-threatening dehydration. Last month the trust successfully treated over 70 per cent of the dogs it saw with parvovirus, with intensive treatment, antibiotics, drugs to control the vomiting, intravenous fluids and other supportive therapy. The virus is highly resistant: it survives for months in the environment and on food bowls, shoes, clothes, carpet and floors, so an unvaccinated dog picks it up easily on the street. No drug can kill it once it is past the early stage, which makes vaccination the only real protection.
Tagged and recorded after surgery
13 February 2020
Dog with a lower jaw fracture
The mobile clinic treats animals on the street every day that are injured, sick, weak and in need of care, and it cannot be done without support. Stray dogs in particular are cruelly mistreated, and a fractured jaw usually means a vehicle or a thrown object. On a recent field visit the team rescued a dog that had been run over by a car and had nearly lost his jaw; he was weak and covered in ticks and fleas. The vets performed wiring surgery to fix the break. He showed immediate progress and healed within a few weeks, and once he has a clean bill of health he will go back to where he came from.

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Leave your details and someone from the project will get back to you. If you have found an injured animal, call the helpline instead — it is answered all day.

+91 99244 18184