WellBeing News Archive

Nov 29, 2021 Global Dog Campaign Case Studies: Kabul, Afghanistan; Chennai, India; Heredia, Costa Rica

Posted at 09:56h In AHPPA (Asociación Humanitaria para la Protección Animal), Animal Well-being, Animals, Articles, BCI (Blue Cross of India), Companion Animals, Global Dog Campaign, Mayhew Afghanistan, WellBeing News - By Andrew Rowan, DPhil

Kabul, AfghanistanAfghanistan recently experienced a change in government, leading to chaotic scenes at Kabul airport as countries evacuated their personnel and individual Afghan citizens sought to leave the country. Dogs were also caught up in this chaos as some animal advocates sought, mostly unsuccessfully, to...

Nov 29, 2021 Dog Homelessness and Development of WBI’s Global Dog Campaign

Posted at 09:52h In Animals, Articles, Companion Animals, Global Dog Campaign, Letter from the President, WellBeing News - By Andrew Rowan, DPhil

On November 30th, we are holding the first webinar on dog homelessness and WBI's Global Dog Campaign (GDC), and it seems an appropriate time to review the background leading up to this moment. In 1983, I started working on dog/cat welfare and demographics in the...

Coal fire with wind power in Germany | Photo credit: Eisenlohr,

Nov 01, 2021 Climate Change and COP26

Posted at 11:31h In Articles, Environment Well-being, Letter from the President, Sustainability/Biodiversity, Well-being, WellBeing News, Wildlife in Water, Wildlife on Land - By Andrew Rowan, DPhil and Kathleen Rowan CEO, WellBeing International

The Letter from the President for September 2021 addressed climate change. This Letter is a follow-up to the previous Letter in September, but we revisit the topic because its importance and gravity to humanity cannot be overstated. We hope to provide a brief primer on...

Nov 01, 2021 Roads & Wildlife: Safeguarding Asia’s Rich Biodiversity

Posted at 11:19h In Articles, CLLC (Center for Large Landscape Conservation), WellBeing News, Wild Animals - By Christine Gianas Weinheimer

For many of us, wildlife-vehicle collisions are a fact of life. In some areas where roads bisect wildlife habitat, collisions or near misses with large mammals like deer are all too familiar, and countless smaller creatures like turtles and squirrels fall victim to automobiles every...

Coyote crossing the road | Photo credit: Henryk Sadura

Nov 01, 2021 Urban Wildlife in New York City

Posted at 11:01h In Articles, WellBeing News, Wild Animals - By John Hadidian, PhD

New Yorkers have never been shy about their city’s achievements. Witness a recent article by Lisa M. Collins (Eagles, Beavers, Sea Turtles: Why N.Y.C. Is Humming with Wildlife - Oct. 28 NYTimes) that celebrates the city as “humming with wildlife” and enjoying a “surprising” renaissance...

Antarctic Glacier | Photo credit: Bernhard Staehli

Oct 04, 2021 Climate Change, Food Systems, and Health Impact at the United Nations

Posted at 12:03h In Articles, Environment Well-being, Letter from the President, Sustainability/Biodiversity, Well-being, WellBeing News - By Andrew Rowan, DPhil

Three significant gatherings address various aspects of climate change, and global limits started in September and proceeded through early November. In September (21 to 27), the United Nations (UN) held its 76th annual meeting (also known as the General Assembly) in New York. During this...

Pink-backed pelicans | Photo credit: Gus Akerhielm

Oct 04, 2021 Counting Birds and Other Wild Animals

Posted at 12:00h In Animal Well-being, Animals, Articles, Sustainability/Biodiversity, WellBeing News - By Andrew Rowan, DPhil

Estimating the total number of wild animals in a particular location or country has always been challenging. Still, better data on wild animal numbers are needed to recognize changes, identify the causes, and what might be done to address such changes. The Living Planet Report...

Oct 04, 2021 Dasgupta Review Revisited

Posted at 11:59h In Articles, Sustainability/Biodiversity, Well-being, WellBeing News - By Andrew Rowan, DPhil

In May, WellBeing News published an article alerting readers to the Dasgupta Review (Review) publication addressing the economics of biodiversity. We suggested that the Review could become a classic along with Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring but have just come across a significant critique of the...

Aug 17, 2021 Cat Management Successes

Posted at 12:16h In Animal Well-being, Articles, Companion Animals, WellBeing News - By Andrew Rowan, DPhil and John Hadidian, PhD

Over the past five to ten years, the academic literature on cat management (specifically outdoor cat management) projects have been enriched by dozens of papers looking at public attitudes to cats and different cat management options and detailing the effects of some cat management projects...

Octopus vulgaris | Photo credit: TheSp4N1SH

Aug 17, 2021 Animal Sentience, Public Awareness, and Public Policy

Posted at 11:52h In Animal Sentience, Animal Well-being, Animals, Articles, Ethics, Regulation, Law, Letter from the President, Public Awareness/Attitudes, WellBeing News - By Andrew Rowan, DPhil

Over the past fifty years, public concern for animals (and “animal sentience”) has prompted significant changes in public policy in many countries worldwide. It is not yet clear what has driven this concern. There had been a similar increase in public concern for animals in...