Mr. Speaker,  

Please end the cruel and unnecessary practice of feline declawing. This potentially crippling surgical procedure can harm a cat’s physical health and result in disturbing behavioral changes. Negative behavioral and health changes caused by declawing can be irreversible and permanent. Declawing can result in unintended, sometimes disastrous, consequences for cats.

I respectfully ask that you pass Representative William O’Brien’s bill, H-7052, and Senator Melissa Murray’s bill, S-2007, as-is, without any amendments and ban this cruel and unnecessary procedure.

You may have heard that Virginia recently passed a declaw ban bill that contained a “human health exemption.”The scientific literature indicates that declawing cats is not an effective means of protecting human health and that declawed cats are more likely to bite than non-declawed cats. The contention that declawing can protect immunocompromised or hemophilic humans has been rejected by the NIH, CDC, Infectious Diseases Society of America, US Public Health Service, National Hemophilia Foundation, Canadian Veterinary Medical Association, and American Cancer Society. The veterinary authorities, the American Association of Feline Practitioners and American Animal Hospital Association, note that declawing is not advised to protect medically vulnerable people.

Please do not consider the “human health” exception which is contrary to scientific evidence and would serve as an exploitable loophole that would not adequately protect cats.

Thank you for all you do to protect the animals of our state!