According to the American Humane Association, over 10 million dogs and cats are lost or stolen in the U.S. every year. And although there are laws, which vary state to state, that define stealing pets as theft, there is a huge gray area with regards to keeping found pets. And there is absolutely nothing in place to prevent and/or catch people with stolen or lost pets.

One deterrent to all of this that is in place is microchipping your pet. However, microchips only get scanned if the pet is picked up by animal control or a willing person brings the pet to a veterinarian office or shelter to get scanned.  And currently microchipping is not mandatory.

If someone chooses to keep your lost pet or has stolen your pet, that pet will never get scanned.

How many of these 10 million pets were stolen right from their homes? How many of these were lost pets that were taken into new homes with no regard for their true home?

Losing a pet is like losing a family member and there needs to be a safety net in place to ensure a higher rate of return of lost and stolen pets to their homes.

One way to very easily catch lost and stolen pets would be to mandate mandatory microchipping of all pets and to mandate mandatory microchip scanning of all pets when taken to a veterinarian office, groomer, kennel or any other animal service business/entity/facility.  If the information of the microchip differs from the identification of the perceived owner then the said establishment must keep the dog until the perceived ownership can be proved or the true owner is located.

It is too easy for people to steal and keep lost pets. Let’s help bring these pets home.