Yesterday Was National Kitten Day. To Celebrate, All States Should Ban Painful, Unnecessary Cat Declawing!
If you, your family, or any of your friends have cats, you’ve probably heard of cat declawing. What you may not know is that cat declawing has been denounced by vets, animal rights activists, and scientists for decades, and for good reason. It is an extremely painful procedure — the equivalent of removing an entire knuckle of a human finger — that leaves kittens and cats with lasting negative health consequences, including infection, tissue necrosis, and intense pain in the paw and back for the rest of their lives.
It’s also extremely dangerous for cats who get loose, eliminating their main way to defend themselves and dramatically increasing their risk for getting attacked by other animals outdoors. For these cats, declawing can be a death sentence. And while proponents of declawing argue it makes cats more adoptable, the procedure doesn’t actually help keep cats in a home. Declawing makes it harder for cats to express their natural behaviors, and has been linked to aggression, trouble using the litter box, and other abnormal behaviors. This means more declawed cats end up abandoned right back in shelters.
In honor of this past National Kitten Day, instead of posting cat memes to social media, it’s a great time for legislators to do their job and actually protect cats and kittens… by banning cat declawing for good! It’s cruel, unnecessary, and happening nearly nationwide. Currently, only Maryland and New York have bans on the torturous procedure, and now every other state must follow suit. Sign now to demand all remaining U.S. states ban cruel, painful, unnecessary cat declawing!