In some countries people eat cows, and while it is completely normal to those people, some other people find the practice culturally offensive. In other countries, people eat dogs and the typical dog-loving American may find that difficult to understand. For the last few weeks I have been working in the Kingdom of Tonga with a New Zealand-based group, South Pacific Animal Welfare (www.spaw.org.nz) to help promote the health and welfare of animals.

Bringing even the most basic concepts of animal care to a country as poor as Tonga is more than a challenge. The unemployment rate is 78 percent. Those people who do work live on an income of $80 a week, which might sound reasonable until you start looking at just the cost of food. There are no commercial agricultural enterprises in Tonga so people survive by subsistence farming of fruits and vegetables augmented with low quality meat products cast off from the more developed countries. An example of that is turkey tail. This is the piece of fat and gristle that is removed during processing and considered waste. These are bundled up and shipped to countries like Tonga. And, yes, dogs are also eaten. Due to this diet and other factors, Tonga has the highest rate of diabetes in the world. Japan and China maintain embassies in Tonga and have extensive aid projects in a number of health and service areas. New Zealand and Australia have consulates and staff in Tonga and also provide significant development aid.

Our veterinary team on this trip consisted of two veterinary nurses from New Zealand, a Kiwi veterinarian who is currently working in Australia, and me. We were also assisted by a Japanese veterinarian who is funded by her government as a part of one of their development projects to try and improve farm animal medicine and husbandry. We also had an animal technician from the Tongan Ministry of Agriculture who helped us in our efforts.

During our stay here, which was shortened by three days due to a Category 2 cyclone, we spayed 21 dogs and 11 cats, neutered 36 dogs and five cats, did 62 small animal exam visits for clinical problems, performed eight additional surgical procedures, made 27 farm call visits, treated 28 pigs, five chickens, one horse, and facilitated the export of two animals to Australia. We had four after-hours emergencies, seven small animal home visits, euthanized five animals that were beyond our help, and had two animals die despite our efforts.

We had two success stories that really boosted our spirits. The first was a 6-week old puppy that came in on an after-hours emergency with its head almost severed from a severe bite wound. It was severely anemic from parasites and fleas, but the owners wanted to try and save it so my nurse monitored anesthesia and fluids while I operated as quickly as I could. We loaded it up on antibiotics and pain medications and on recheck a few days later he was back to eating.

The second success story was a 3-month-old puppy that a Tongan driver intentionally swerved to hit and then stopped to pick up to take home for the supper pot. Unfortunately for him, our on-island coordinator was following behind him and saw the whole thing, so she jumped out of her car with full Tongan invectives flying and took the dog from him and brought it to the clinic. Fortunately, the injuries were fairly minor so after two days we were able to place the puppy with one of the South African engineers who works for the local airline.

I did learn something during my stay that I will try and hang on to. In the midst of desperate poverty and an attitude towards animals that is often cruel, you still find people that care deeply and try and do what they can to share this world with the animals we live with. The South Pacific Animal Welfare motto sums it up best: “You cannot change the world by saving one animal, but you can change the world for that one animal.”

Oh yeah, and the dog named Stir Fry, he was another puppy saved from the cooking pot several years ago. His name was to remind him of the fate he escaped, but he seems more interested in keeping the cats in line on the coffee plantation where he now lives.

Dr. Kiel is the U.S. Army veterinarian currently supporting NAS Whidbey Island and Naval Station Everett.