What is it about?
The Covid-19 pandemic greatly affected human-animal interaction projects, such as animal-assisted interventions (AAIs). To control the spread of the SARS-Cov-2 virus, several (inter)national organisations, came up with new safety protocols. Most of them focus on the risks from the human participants and the settings where the sessions occur. However, little is known yet about the pandemic's impact on animals' needs for adapted housing, management, and the possible welfare issues due to lifestyle adaptions. On top, animal-assisted interventions are frequently mentioned as one type of intervention with animals' assistance. Still, these programs vary in almost every aspect. The only common trait is animals' involvement in attending to a human need, be the need physical, psychological, educational, or even recreational. This publication aims to give an insight into the complexity of AAIs and the ethical considerations about the impact of Covid-19 safety protocols on both humans and animals.
Featured Image
Photo by Patrick Hendry on Unsplash
Why is it important?
In our opinion, a one-fits-all COVID-19 safety protocol for AAI programs will be hard or even impossible due to the broad diversity in AAIs. As a basis for future safety protocols in AAIs, we advocate for integrated human and animal health and welfare assessments to provide a framework for ‘One Health’ approaches in AAIs.
Perspectives
Writing this article was a great pleasure as it has co-authors with whom I have a long-standing friendship, collaboration, and a shared passion for research. Furthermore, I wish that this article may be an inspiration to continue working and studying together the possibilities and caveats of animal-assisted interventions. Finally, a warm thank you to Simona Normando for stimulating discussions.
Lieve Lucia Meers
BIAAT Foundation
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: The State of Animal-Assisted Interventions: COVID-19 Safety Protocols and Ethical Considerations, Journal of Applied Animal Ethics Research, May 2021, Brill,
DOI: 10.1163/25889567-bja10019.
You can read the full text:
Contributors
The following have contributed to this page
