MORE than 50 struggling dogs were rescued from hard-hit communities in Jamaica’s south-western parishes in the aftermath of Hurricane Melissa, and many have since found homes outside of the island.

Addressing a post-Melissa special media briefing at Jamaica House on Wednesday, Minister of Agriculture Floyd Green said, while the priority was on saving lives and taking assistance to people in the devastated communities, there was concern about Melissa’s impact on animals, including pets.

Green told the briefing that members of the Veterinary Services Unit in his ministry, along with members of the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF), made it their mission to save some of these pets, namely dogs, who had been marooned.

He said personnel from the Veterinary Services Unit went with the JDF “on a sort of air reconnaissance to look to see where we had marooned animals, to look to see where we were having particular challenges because of flooding.

“The ministry facilitated the export of 58 dogs which were rescued through some of these missions… Some of them to the US, some of them to Canada,” Green shared.

According to Green the Veterinary Services Division has been doing tremendous work in the wake of the category 5 storm which hit the island on October 28.

“In fact, we’re now offering free veterinary clinics across various parishes. We were already down in St Elizabeth, St James, and Westmoreland, and we are going to Clark’s Town in Trelawny next week. That allows our farmers, and pet owners, to be able to carry their animals to receive treatment, medication, wound care, vaccines and nutritional support,” said Green.

There is no estimate on the number of pets who might have lost their lives during Melissa as the focus remains on the devastation the Category 5 storm left in sections of the island including the deaths of people.

The Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) has reported 45 Melissa-related deaths so far with 18 people still missing.

In addition to the loss of human lives thousands of livestock and pets also perished across the island.

In an update to Parliament on November 11, Green reported that farmers lost 5,600 pigs, 3,560 small ruminants (goats and sheep), and 2,850 cattle.

Also lost were 458,000 layers representing over 40 per cent of laying hens and 780,000 broilers.

At that time Green said the preliminary estimate of the losses suffered by the agricultural sector totalled $30 billion. That has since been doubled to $60 billion based on the World Bank’s rapid assessment of the damage.