Manitoulin Island and the North Shore face a critical shortage of large animal veterinarians, leaving farmers without professional care for sick or calving livestock. Local leaders are organizing a letter-writing campaign and seeking government and veterinary college support to fund recruitment.
MINDEMOYA鈥擣armers on Manitoulin Island with large animal farms are in dire straits without the services of a veterinarian to provide care for an animal that is sick or calving, members of the Manitoulin Municipal Association (MMA) were informed at a meeting last week.
鈥淚 brought this issue forward previously, concerning the need for a large animal veterinarian. We are badly in need of a large animal veterinarian for Manitoulin and the North Shore,鈥 stated Bruce Wood, a local farmer and member of the Town of Northeastern Manitoulin and the Islands (NEMI) council. 鈥淭his is an ongoing issue, being without a veterinarian. As farmers, we don鈥檛 have the proper equipment, education or technology if a cow, for instance, is calving or an animal gets sick. Right now, we are being forced to do work that we are not trained to do, so we have to keep pushing this issue forward.鈥 He noted the University of Guelph had at one time promoted everyone in the Ontario Veterinarians College to go into the small animal veterinarian profession.
鈥淎ll of Northern Ontario, at least the vast majority of the area does not have a large animal vet,鈥 stated Mr. Wood.
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