Three animal welfare groups have expressed dismay over an administrative order approved last June which allows the inhumane killing of dogs in city pounds.

Members of the Compassion and Responsibility towards Animals (CARA), Philippine Animal Welfare Society (PAWS), and Animal Kingdom Foundation Inc. (AKF) joined hands in promoting their "No to Tambucho (vehicle exhaust) Killing" campaign against the Administrative Order on Euthanasia of Animals under Republic Act 8485, or the Animal Welfare Law.

The law, which was passed by the Committee on Animal Welfare (CAW) and approved by the Department of Agriculture, legalizes the use of carbon monoxide gas exhausted from vehicles in gassing of dogs in city pounds. It was approved by 12 out of 14 members of CAW.

Only two members, PAWS and the Philippine Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PASPCA), disapproved the gassing method.

Anna H. Cabrera, program director of PAWS, said a previous Administrative Order had already cited several humane methods for killing cats and dogs out of mercy. The addition of the use of carbon monoxide from vehicle gas exhaust is what caught their attention.

"Dogs housed in city pounds that are not adopted or retrieved by their former owners will be the ones affected. We at the animal welfare sector realize the fact that not all dogs inside pounds will be adopted or retrieved. But the method of gassing them is not acceptable for us as a form of euthanasia in a civilized country such as ours and is inhumane," she said.

Members of the committee who approved the method were the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), Department of Education (DepEd), Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) of the Department of Agriculture (DA), Protected Areas and Wildlife Bureau (PAWB) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), National Meat Inspection Commission (NMIC), Agriculture Training Institute (ATI), Philippine Veterinary Medical Association (PVMA), Veterinary Practitioners Association of the Philippines (VPAP), Philippine Animal Hospital Association (PAHA), Philippine Society of Swine Practitioners (PSSP), Philippine College of Canine Practitioners (PCCP), and the Philippine Society of Animal Science (PSAS).

During a press conference at Cubao, Quezon City organized by PAWS, a video clip that came from a concerned citizen was played showing the gassing method performed in the province of Magpet, North Cotabato.

In the video, four men were seen putting eight live dogs inside a metal box measuring less than three feet high, about half a meter wide, and about one meter deep. Once inside, the exhaust end of a small truck was placed at a hole located at the rear end of the metal box. The truck is then revved up for around 10 minutes or until the dogs stopped making noise.

"If you analyze the whole method, the way they placed the dogs into the metal box alone is already cruel. The argument of the local government veterinarians is that the use of the euthal drug is expensive," said Luis Buenaflor, Director for Operations and External Affairs of AKF.

Euthal (or sodium pentobarbital) is the commonly used drug in euthanasing a cat or dog. A 100ml bottle of euthal is enough to euthanize 20 100-kilogram dogs. The cost for each is placed at around P147.50. The gassing method, on the other hand, is estimated to cost less  P5 per dog based on the consumption of gas used in an engine revved for 10 to 15 minutes.

"The drug initiallyaffects the brain depressing all it activities. It then leads to an anesthesia-like effect wherein the subject will lose all feelings of sensation from the brain to the heart and eventually deep sleep," explained Dr. Wilford Almoro, resident veterinarian of the PAWS Animal Rehabilitation Center (PARC).