Feline better: New York bans cat declawing

AP

ALBANY, New York — New York became the first US state to ban the declawing of cats on Monday, joining most of Europe, several Canadian provinces and a growing list of American cities that already prohibit a procedure animal advocates call cruel and unnecessary.

“Declawing is a cruel and painful procedure that can create physical and behavioral problems for helpless animals, and today it stops,” said Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, who signed the New York ban.

Supporters of the new law, which took effect immediately, predict it will lead to similar proposals across the country.

Triumph for cats

“Victory!” tweeted People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, an animal rights group, following the governor’s announcement.

“This is a real triumph for cats and the people who love them,” said Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal, a Democrat who first introduced the bill in January 2015. “This has catapulted New York to a leadership position when it comes to cruelty against felines.”

Declawing a cat involves slicing through bone to amputate the first segment of a cat’s toes. The operation was once commonly performed to protect furniture and human skin from feline scratching but has in recent years come under scrutiny by animal welfare advocates, cat owners and many veterinarians.

While many veterinarians urged lawmakers to pass the ban, the state’s largest veterinary organization opposed the bill.

The New York State Veterinary Medical Society argued that declawing should be allowed as a last resort for felines that won’t stop scratching furniture or humans — or when the cat’s owner has a weakened immune system, putting them at greater risk of infection from a scratch.

“Medical decisions should be left to the sound discretion of fully trained, licensed and state supervised professionals,” the society said in a memo opposing the legislation.

Declawing a cat is already illegal in much of Europe and Canada, as well as in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Denver, but no other US state has voted to ban the procedure.

According to The Paw Project, a California-based group that supports bans on declawing, bills to prohibit the procedure are pending in several states, including New Jersey, California and Massachusetts, where lawmakers held a hearing on the measure on Monday.

The practice is common in the United States where pet owners often do it to stop themselves from being scratched or to protect their furniture.

But the New York bill says it can cause cats severe pain and psychological disorders and can also lead to the early onset of arthritis.

Traumatic

Supporters of bans cite estimates that a quarter or more of all domestic cats in the United States have had the procedure.

“For a cat, declawing is both psychologically and physically harmful,” said Becky Robinson, president and founder of Alley Cat Allies, a Bethesda, Maryland-based organization. “The surgery is traumatic, and the resulting disfigurement causes severe pain.”

Under the bill, which easily passed the Democrat-led Senate and Assembly in early June, veterinarians could still perform the procedure for medical reasons, such as infection or injury.