Category: General News
https://www.ibanet.org/Legal-systems-increasingly-utilised-to-protect-animals
Joanne Harris – Monday 2 June 2025
In April, Michoacán became the sixth Mexican state to ban bullfighting, while the previous month, legislators in Mexico City approved legislation to reform the sport. These reforms will ban ‘traditional’ bullfighting, limiting the length of contests and preventing matadors from killing their animal opponents – making the sport ‘bloodless’. Meanwhile in 2024, the Colombian President signed a bill that calls on the country’s government to completely ban bullfights by 2027.
These developments are part of a number of recent legislative and legal efforts around the world aimed at enhancing animal welfare. In New Zealand, the government plans to outlaw greyhound racing – a result, it says, of the significant number of injuries and deaths suffered by the dogs. It intends to introduce legislation later this year. Meanwhile, a growing number of non-profit organisations are seeking to protect animal rights through the courts.
‘It’s unmistakeable that there’s a growing trend in favour of protecting animals through the legal system,’ says Christopher Berry, Executive Director of US-based organisation the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP). His organisation is now 30 years old, but Berry believes the use of the law to enhance animal welfare has taken strides forward in recent years.
‘We’re currently in the midst of a global change in society’s relationship with animals,’ Berry says, highlighting how science is delving deeper into their intelligence, emotions and communication. There’s reportedly a boom in such research, with an ever-increasing range of species observed using tools or playing for fun.
Helen Mitcheson, a director at non-profit legal organisation Cet Law – which focuses on advocating for the protection of whales, porpoises and dolphins – agrees science has been one of the factors in the growing regulation of facilities that house captive cetaceans in recent years. However, ‘there’s not one driver or one-size-fits-all movement to stop captivity or change practices in captivity and in a lot of cases it’s not even a legal driver. It’s driven by legislative, political and social actions,’ Mitcheson says.
Looking back at the history of the anti-bullfighting movement in Mexico, Cecilia Stahlhut, Secretary of the IBA Healthcare and Life Sciences Committee, explains that the sport was suspended in Mexico City in 2022, but the ban was later overturned by the country’s Supreme Court in 2023. Since then, groups advocating both for and against bullfighting have been vocal on the subject.
The details of Mexico City’s reforms are still awaited. The city’s government has seven months to publish secondary regulations, detailing exactly how the changes will be brought about. ‘Most of the groups that support bullfights will wait until that moment to submit any claim against this amendment. That’s when the real legal fight will begin,’ says Stahlhut, who’s also a partner at Hogan Lovells in Mexico City.
While other states have already introduced regulations to prohibit bullfights – and also contests involving dogs – some are waiting to see how the situation in Mexico City develops, says Stahlhut. However, she adds that Mexico has strong regulations around animal protection. At the end of 2024, the Mexican Constitution was amended to explicitly protect animals from cruelty and to allow Congress to legislate in matters of their protection and welfare.
At a federal level, these amendments to the Constitution enhanced the protection of animals in the country, and Stahlhut says the Mexico City proposals on bullfighting would bring its state legislation in line with federal laws. ‘It’s just to be consistent with what the government at a state and federal level has been working on. You can’t criminalise certain acts against animals and not other ones,’ she says.
However, legislation protecting animals can lead to complex knock-on effects. In 2021, France banned whale and dolphin displays at aquariums – a move that has, according to park managers, directly led to the closure of facilities such as Marineland in Antibes, which shut its doors in January. Mitcheson says the park is still responsible for the care of the dolphins it had in captivity, and questions remain about where they should be sent.
Similar questions arise in the case of Happy the elephant, who has been in captivity in the Bronx Zoo since 1977. NhRP brought a case to the New York courts arguing that Happy was entitled to the right of habeas corpus – which would allow a challenge to the elephant’s detention. The New York Court of Appeals rejected the case in 2022, but two judges wrote dissenting opinions saying Happy did have a right to freedom – even if that involved merely moving to a more spacious sanctuary. Bronx Zoo operator the Wildlife Conservation Society maintains its elephants are well cared for.
Efforts to give animals legal rights are growing worldwide. In 2024, Polynesian Indigenous leaders signed the He Whakaputanga Moana – or Declaration for the Ocean – granting whales legal personhood. That move was followed by a pro bono initiative involving the UK’s Simmons & Simmons, marine law firm Ocean Vision Legal and the Pacific Whale Fund, to draft proposed legislation called ‘Te Mana o Te Tohorā’ (‘the enduring power of whales’), which would offer nations a pathway to adopt similar laws. ‘Legal personhood for environmental bodies is a real topic,’ says Mitcheson. ‘It’s very academic at the moment because the difficulty of it is implementation.’
Cultural barriers will probably also remain a challenge when it comes to implementing legislation protecting animals, and there are significant differences in the ways jurisdictions look at these issues – what may be permitted in one country could be banned in another.
But recent trends certainly show a move towards enhanced animal welfare protection through legislation, regulation and the courts. ‘There’s a lot of energy and there is a lot of progress being made,’ says Berry. ‘It’s incremental and it’s frustrating and there’s a lot of obstacles in our way, but I’m very positive about the way this is headed in the long term. How fast it spreads and how quickly remains to be seen, but the trend line is for more protection and higher legal status for animals.’
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20250602-how-your-pets-alter-your-immune-system
Getty Images
Living with animals is thought to have profound effects on our immunity – potentially reducing the risk of allergies, eczema and even autoimmune conditions.
Since they first emigrated from Central Europe to North America in the 18th Century, the Amish have become known for their unique lifestyle. Today they are reliant on the same practices of dairy cattle farming and horse-borne transportation that were followed by their ancestors for centuries.
The Amish have gripped the imaginations of Hollywood scriptwriters, documentary makers and sociologists for decades. But in the past 10 years, their way of life has become of increasing interest to the medical world too, as they seem to defy one particularly concerning modern trend. While rates of immune-related conditions which begin in childhood, such as asthma, eczema and allergies, have soared since the 1960s, this has not been the case for the Amish.
The reason for this is revealing insights into how our immune systems operate – and the profound ways that the animals in our lives are affecting them.
A diverse community
To try and understand why the Amish have lower rates of certain immune conditions, a group of scientists spent time back in 2012 with an Amish community in the state of Indiana, and with another farming community known as the Hutterites, in South Dakota. In both cases, they took blood samples from 30 children and studied their immune systems in detail.
There are many similarities between the two groups. Like the Amish, the Hutterites also live off the land, have European ancestry, have minimal exposure to air pollution and follow a diet which is low in processed foods. However, their rates of asthma and childhood allergies are between four and six times higher than among the Amish.
One difference between the two communities is that while the Hutterites have fully embraced industrialised farming technologies, the Amish have not, meaning that from a young age, they live in close contact with animals and the plethora of microbes that they carry.
“If you look at an aerial drone photographs of Amish settlements, and compare them with Hutterite communities, the Amish are living on the farm with the animals, whereas the Hutterites live in little hamlets, and the farm could be a few miles away,” says Fergus Shanahan, professor emeritus of medicine at University College Cork, Ireland.
In 2016, a team of scientists from the US and Germany published a now-landmark study concluding that Amish children have a lower risk of allergies because of the way their environments shape their immune systems. In particular, the researchers found that the Amish children in their study had more finely tuned so-called regulatory T cells than those from Hutterite backgrounds. These cells help to dampen down unusual immune responses.
When the researchers scanned dust samples collected from the homes of Amish and Hutterite children for signs of bacteria, they found clear evidence that Amish children were being exposed to more microbes, likely from the animals that they lived among.
Around the world, other scientists have been making similar findings. A group of immunologists reported that children growing up on Alpine farms, where cows typically sleep in close proximity to their owners, seemed to be protected against asthma, hayfever and eczema. Other research has found that a child’s allergy risk at ages seven to nine seems to decrease proportionally with the number of pets which were present in the home in their early years of life, dubbed the “mini-farm effect”.
“It’s not a universal cure-all, and every time I give a lecture on this, someone goes, ‘Well I grew up on a farm and I’ve got allergies’, but we know that if you grow up physically interacting with farm animals, you have about a 50% reduction in your likelihood of developing asthma or allergies,” says Jack Gilbert, a professor at the University of California San Diego who was involved in the Amish study, and also cofounded the American Gut Project – a citizen science project studying how our lifestyles affect our microbiomes. “Even if you just grow up with a dog in your home, you have a 13-14% reduction in risk,” he says.
Protective pets
Since the Amish study was first published, the potentially protective effect of interacting with animals during childhood has been the subject of much fascination, with the New York Times even publishing an article asking whether pets are the new “probiotic”.
So what’s going on? Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the tactile nature of humans and our fondness for stroking and fondling our pets, when we live with animals, microbes from their fur and paws have been shown to end up on our skin – at least temporarily.
This has led to suggestions that the “microbiome” could be colonised by bugs from our pets. This is the collection of vast colonies of microbes that live on our skin, in our mouths and most notably in the gut, which hosts a significant concentration of our body’s immune cells. According to Nasia Safdar, an infectious disease professor at the University of Wisconsin in the US, this concept has attracted interest from the pet food industry. The idea would be to develop products marketed as promoting the growth of beneficial bacteria in cats and dogs, which might then be transferred to their owners, she says.
“That angle has been an attractive one for people to fund, because for most of us, it’s the human condition that we’re interested in,” says Safdar. “So what role can the animal play in that?” she asks.
Safdar says she is considering running a study which would involve collecting faecal samples from both pets and their human owners when they come for repeated veterinary appointments to see if their guts become more microbially similar with time. She also wants to see if she can identify similar bacterial species which could confer health benefits.
However, others feel that the idea of dog or cat or any other kind of non-human animal microbes being incorporated into our microbiomes is dubious. “There’s zero evidence of that whatsoever,” says Gilbert. “We don’t really find long-term accumulation of dog bacteria on our skin, in our mouth, or in our guts. They don’t really stick around.”
In response to this, Safdar says that she still feels the study is very much worthwhile, stating she feels it is plausible that gut microbes can be transferred from pets to their owners and vice versa. “It’s worth studying and hasn’t been closely looked at yet,” she says.
Gilbert believes that pets are playing a different, yet equally vital role. His theory is that because our distant ancestors domesticated various species, our immune systems have evolved to be stimulated by the microbes that they carry. These microbes do not reside with us permanently, but our immune cells recognise the familiar signals as they pass through, which then keeps the immune system developing in the right way.
“Over many millennia, the human immune system got used to seeing dog, horse and cow bacteria,” says Gilbert. “And so when it sees those things, it triggers beneficial immune development. It knows what to do,” he says.
Studies have also shown that humans who live in the same household as a pet end up with gut microbiomes which are more like each other, and Gilbert suggests that the animal is likely acting as a vehicle to help transfer human microbes between its owners. At the same time, regular exposure to the pet’s own microbes will also be stimulating their immune systems to stay more active and better manage the bacterial populations in their own gut and skin microbiomes, keeping pathogens out and stimulating the growth of useful bacteria.
Ancient microbes
This is all good news for animal lovers, with research continuing to suggest that living with pets across our life course can be good for our immune system.
After reading the study on the Amish and the Hutterites, Shanahan was inspired to conduct his own research on Irish travellers, a marginalised population who typically live in confined spaces amongst multiple animals – from dogs and cats to ferrets and horses.
Shanahan sequenced their gut microbiomes and compared them with Irish people living more modern lifestyles today, as well as microbiomes sequenced from indigenous populations in Fiji, Madagascar, Mongolia, Peru and Tanzania who still live a lifestyle akin to our hunter-gatherer ancestors. He discovered that the microbiome of Irish travellers was more similar to the indigenous groups. He said that their microbiome also bore similarities to that of humans from the pre-industrialised world, which other scientific groups have been able to study by collecting ancient faecal samples preserved in caves.
“The Irish travellers have retained an ancient microbiome,” says Shanahan. “It’s far more similar to what you see from tribes in Tanzania who still live like hunter-gatherers or the Mongolian horseman who live in yurts, close to their animals.”
Shanahan believes that this may explain the low rates of autoimmune diseases in Irish traveller populations: conditions like inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, multiple sclerosis and other diseases, which like asthma and allergies, have become increasingly common in recent decades.
“This isn’t to say that their health is good,” says Shanahan. “Irish travellers are dying much earlier than the settled community. But they’re dying from things like alcoholism, suicide and accidents, driven by poverty and marginalisation and their culture being eroded. But go to an Irish rheumatologist and ask if they’ve ever seen a traveller with systemic lupus [an autoimmune condition], they’ve never seen it.”
Now researchers are looking to see whether introducing animals back into our lives in various ways can be beneficial for our health across the life course. Researchers at the University of Arizona in the US have explored whether rehoming unwanted dogs with older adults could help to improve their physical and mental health by boosting their immune systems. And results from an Italian research group which created an educational farm where children from homes with no pets could regularly pet horses under supervision suggested that the children’s gut microbiomes started to produce more beneficial metabolites.
Gilbert says it’s plausible that this could be a means of improving childhood immunity. “If you’re exposed to more types of bacteria, you are going to stimulate your immune system in more variable ways, which may then improve its ability to manage the microbes on your skin and in your gut,” he says. “But you’re not being colonised by animal bacteria, that’s not happening.”
Researchers point out that having pets throughout your life can also facilitate more microbial interactions with your immune system in other ways. For example, having a dog makes you more likely to go for regular walks, notes Liam O’Mahoney, professor of immunology at APC Microbiome Ireland, a microbiome-dedicated research centre at University College Cork.
“If you have a pet, you get out and about in the environment and go for walks in the park,” says O’Mahoney. “And by doing that, you’re also being exposed to microbes from the park, the soil, everywhere which can all be useful.”
3 Jun 2025 09.00 CEST
A new point in history has been reached, entomologists say, as climate-led species’ collapse moves up the food chain even in supposedly protected regions free of pesticides
Daniel Janzen only began watching the insects – truly watching them – when his ribcage was shattered. Nearly half a century ago, the young ecologist had been out documenting fruit crops in a dense stretch of Costa Rican forest when he fell in a ravine, landing on his back. The long lens of his camera punched up through three ribs, snapping the bones into his thorax.
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https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex%3A32005R0001
Believe me; as a welfare campaigner for all animals suffering live transport over several decades; Council Regulation 1/2005 of 22nd December 2004, has become like a bad rash throughout its entire existence.
From the start, it never worked. Over the years this document has been read, reviewed and checked over time and time again to see if we in welfare can gather anything with which to take prosecutions forward.
Now, as covered in my very recent post https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2025/06/01/eu-what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-some-meps-policy-makers-propose-making-the-transport-sector-a-damn-site-worse/ there is movement in some sectors of the EU Parliament to turn what has always been a complete farce as 1/2005 into an even bigger car crash now. Please click on the link above to find out more.
Here is the link to the English version of the legislation – https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32005R0001
Other EU nationality versions can be found using the eur lex europa link given at the start.
This post is simply written to give everyone an insight into the ‘legal’ issues legislation wise if you want to take things further. Take it from me; there is a lot to absorb as you can see.
The new proposals being put forward now by some MEP’s fill me with dread – a new updated / revised version of 1/2005 should be being presented now to further help and further support ALL animals suffering the indignity of live transportation. 1/2005 has always been, and will continue to be a joke until it finally goes to that big trash basket in the sky. We as campaigners will all rejoice; but what will follow on afterwards with political point scoring now appearing to take priority over what should be animal welfare, science based fact ?
Please enjoy browsing the English version of 1/2005 from the above link.
WHO KNOWS WHAT IS LYING IN WAIT FOR TH FUTURE.
Regards Mark
Picture this, a cow doing what it is intended to do – grazing outdoors and feeding, yes, on grass.
Difficult to believe; but Sweden is the only country in the world where cows over 6 months old must be given the opportunity to graze outdoors in Summer. Is that not a sensible and logical thing ? – cows outdoors in the sun eating grass ?
Now this right is under threat as farming unions move TO LOWER COSTS.
As anyone with any sense will tell you; grazing is an important natural behaviour for cows as it contributes to their physical and mental wellbeing. In 2019 the Swedish Board of Agriculture assessed that the grazing issue is too big an animal health and animal welfare issue for it to be removed or replaced. https://www.regeringen.se/contentassets/f5bfaefffbef406ab945f25e687087ef/sjv-rapport-2019-17-krav-pa-att-halla-djur-losgaende.pdf
The European Food Safety Authority also recommends that access to pasture should be mandatory in its latest scientific opinion of dairy cows – https://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/pub/7993
The country’s unique grazing experience is being questioned by the Swedish Farmers Association and other bodies, who argue that this policy makes the rearing of animals in Sweden more expensive than in other parts of the European Union – the EU, thus reducing competitiveness; hence they want the legal settlement to be removed; thus allowing farmers to decide for themselves.
These demands have been picked up by politicians; Minister of Rural Affairs, one Peter Kullgen, has appointed an enquiry into ‘Strengthen competitiveness for food producers’. Kullgrens Party has for many years asked and petitioned the Riksdag to have the grazing requirement removed by law.
The requirement TO ALLOW GRAZING is very well supported by the Swedish public; 84% of Swedes believing that it is important for animals to move freely outdoors. In another study https://www.nature.com/articles/srep44953 it was fount that an overwhelming 95% believe that it is important, or very important, that cows are allowed to graze.
Several animal welfare groups are pushing hard to ensure the legislation is not repealed and that Sweden’s high standards for cows are maintained.
At the end of March, the groups shown with their logos above, held demonstrations outside the Swedish Parliament; in addition to handing over a petition signed by no less than 165,000 persons. The press and media have been very supportive, giving the campaign lots of air time.
Like the current live export issue at the EU Parliament, one has to ask if we are witnessing here again trivial political point scoring overriding proven scientific animal welfare science – we would suggest probably a big ‘yes’ !
We at WAV wish all of our Swedish animal welfare campaigner friends the very best with their campaign to defend the rights of Swedish cows – they have huge public support on their side, so lets hope things continue unchanged for the cows !
In a landmark decision, the Lahore High Court has declared the killing of all stray dogs, by shooting, poisoning or other inhumane methods as illegal and unconstitutional across Punjab.
Continue reading this landmark decision in full here:
I say ‘some’ in the heading; but will acknowledge there have also been some brilliant MEP’s fighting very hard in the defence of animals who are suffering during transport; one immediately springs to mind: Anja Hazenkamp – A Dutch MEP and true hero for all animals:
Those of us who have many decades of experience in investigating the immense wrongs of long distance live animal transport across Europe have always had a saying – ‘Crowd all the negative thinking MEPs together in a transporter truck; with temperatures exceeding 35 degrees; with them crapping and peeing all over each other – THEN SEE HOW QUICKLY THEY WOULD CHANGE THE LEGISLATION WITHIN EUROPE FOR IMPROVEMENTS !!’
Sadly; but realistically; you have to ask what planet some of these people are from; as over 3,000 amendments to the draft update of the Transport Regulation proposed by Members of the European Parliament (MEP) ARE CERTAINLY NOT looking at improving the welfare of animals suffering live transportation across the EU. MEPs represent you – EU Citizens; so are they not supposed to have a certain level of intelligence ?
Several negative thinking MEPs have put forward ideas and suggestions which would weaken or even remove laws that are grossly outdated anyway; and certainly NOT welfare supplements for the billions of sentients being hauled all over Europe each day. Some of the suggested amendments are so bizzare they should be up with the fairies; but they are not; these are proposals presented by some realistic members of the European Parliament.
The Transport Regulation was created over 20 years ago to ‘protect the welfare of animals during transport’ – it never did, and has never worked in the defence of animals – full stop. This chance to now rework the existing joke of legislation should be an ideal opportunity to make thing so much better; but we have some very serious concerns about some proposed changes being put on the table by some MEPs.
Here is just as one example – one of thousands of recent undercover investigations, here is where current legislation fails the animals. Please take note of stoppage time failures = meaning extensive additional suffering for the animals.
Photo above – Essere Animali
By bringing the policy in line with the latest welfare led science; as well as the recommendations by the European Food Safety Authority, and outlawing some useless, harmful and unnecessary practices, policy makers, the MEPs, could significantly improve the legislation for animals in transport; as well as eradicating the worst aspects of live exports. Unfortunately at this present time, this is not the way things appear to be currently going.
Of the most concern are that if voted on and implemented, in the final policy; some of the legislation would, rather then could, harm rather than help the animals.
Thin I am joking when I say this ? it’s no joke when animal suffering is involved;
The worst amendment put forward on journey times
- Each transport journey should consist of multiple parts, EACH lasting up to 29 hours
- Journey times for unweaned calves; lambs, kids, piglets and foals could last for up to 66 sixty six hours.
Transport is inherently stressful for any animal at the best of times, especially those in the early times of their lives. Numerous studies have shown that young animals being transported suffer more than than their elderly peers; as they suffer more due to higher stress and the inability to regulate their own body temperatures. Unweaned animals suffers more as they cannot reach; or are not familiar with drinkers carried of transporters. the only source they know is from their mothers.
Welfare organisations have always stated that journey times should last for a ONE OFF maximum of 8 hours for adult ovines, bovines and swine; and a ONE OFF MAXIMUM OF 4 hours for very young farm animals, which should also include all birds and rabbits.
The worst amendments put forward on extreme temperatures include;
- Provisions to protect terrestrial animals in extreme road and rail temperatures SHOULD BE REMOVED !
- Thermal provisions to protect the welfare of animals in containers; including birds and rabbits SHOULD BE REMOVED
Extreme temperatures, especially in Summer, is one of the biggest problems of the live export industry. Past investigations by NGOs have shown that temperatures inside trucks can reach 50 degrees C; leading to severe welfare problems; sometimes fatalities.
The EFSA authority recommends the implementation of lower maximum standards during transport; and that welfare organisations demand that specific species maximums must be defined by official legislation.
The worst amendments on space allowance include:
- New space allowance provisions, written in line with recommendations by the European Food Safety Authority SHOULD BE REMOVED.
Animals usually suffer from a lack of adequate space during transport. This makes it impossible for them to lie down, move naturally or even move at all to reach essential drinkers. This incapacity exacerbates several of the problems animals already feel, including stress, exhaustion and dehydration.
Welfare science strongly suggests that species and category-specific space allowances must be set by law. Removing or weakening space allowances is clearly a step in the wrong direction.
Getting back on the right path.
The policy of updating the Transport Regulation should be to ensure better protection for all animals undergoing transportation, and not to make a bad situation even worse. MEPs need to unite; accept the latest welfare solutions to them; which is BASED ON SCIENCE. They need to accept the solutions to improve welfare rather then try to score cheap political points as the priority. Only then will the new legislation deliver what it was intended to do.
Further Information
EU based animal welfare anti live export campaign organisations:
https://www.ciwf.org.uk/our-campaigns/ban-live-exports-internationally/
https://www.eyesonanimals.com/
https://www.animals-angels.de/en/
Please help finding the culprit, if you’re in the area. The Kris Kelly Foundation may also be glad for donations (vet costs). Thank you.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy8nkr3yp88o
01.06.2025
Between 10 and 12 dogs a month are being handed over to Dr Mark Afua’s animal shelter in Lagos – Kelechi Anozia / BBC
Preye Maxwell looks distressed as he leaves his beloved dog Hanks at an animal shelter in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial hub.
Fighting back tears, he says: “I can’t afford to take care of him. I can’t afford to feed him the way he should be fed.”
His two-year old American Eskimo barks as his owner turns his back and walks out of the St Mark’s Animal Rescue Foundation in the Lagos suburb of Ajah.
Dr Mark Afua, a vet and chairman of the rescue centre, takes Hanks and puts him in a big metal cage – one of many in the single-storey building designed for dogs, cats, snakes and other animals.
Hanks wheels around in circles in his cage – and Dr Afua tries to calm the distressed fluffy-haired dog.
Mr Maxwell, an online media strategist, was recently made redundant. His job-hunting means he is never at home and so feels unable to look after Hanks.
“I’m trying to get whatever I have to do to survive. I don’t even have the time now [to look after Hanks] because I’m always out looking for jobs,” he told the BBC.
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World Animals Voice 