Nearly a hundred organizations, companies, institutions, administrations and private individuals have received recognition from the College of Veterinarians of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the act “Veterinarians under the volcano. Tribute to the collaborators of the volunteer veterinarians of La Palma”.
The event was attended by the Minister of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries of the Government of the Canary Islands, Alicia Vanoostende; the fourth vice president of the Cabildo de La Palma, Nieves Hernández; the rector of the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Luis Serra; and the president of the College of Veterinarians of Las Palmas, Alejandro Suárez.
As María Luisa Fernández, president of the Veterinary Association of Tenerife, recalled, it was an hour and a half before the eruption when the Red Cross requested the action of the Association in the emergency.
“From that moment and until January 31, 2022, 49 days after the eruption ended, on December 13, a total of 134 days passed,” said Fernández, according to a note from the collegiate entity.
The president of the veterinarians of the western islands explained that those 134 days were the debut of Tenerife veterinarians in the world of emergencies, since those of Las Palmas had already had that experience in fires.
But for the people of Tenerife and Palmeros “it was our first time working side by side with the administrations and institutions that work on emergency actions in cases of catastrophe. Those days have been, unintentionally, our first drill”.
Although it is true that they had a basis to act because the two professional associations, both Las Palmas and Tenerife, “we had been working hand in hand with the Government of the Canary Islands and the Red Cross for a couple of years, on the action protocols” but there had been no chance to put them into practice.
The meeting took place at the Benahoarita Museum in Los Llanos de Aridane, where the teams that dedicated entire days to saving the animals affected by the emergency met again: Seprona, UME, Civil Protection, Red Cross, firefighters, those who joined to the veterinarians and “patted” the exclusion zones to supply the feral animals or those that did not allow themselves to be caught and to rescue animals of all kinds: livestock, dogs, cats, birds, exotics.
For the first time, even internationally, animals were not left to their own devices and were treated as what they are: sentient beings who had to be rescued, healed and protected, adds the note.
The meeting paid tribute to the volunteer veterinarians from all the islands, including the Peninsula, as well as those who coordinated all the operations from Tenerife, Sonsoles García and Sara Capelli, but the recognition of the six volunteer veterinarians from La Palma, to whom they were present 24 hours a day, seven days a week: Ruth Torres, Elena Tarife, Alejandra Ortega, Evaristo de la Rosa, Anabela García and César Bravo.
After that first level of care in the hands of the more than 130 volunteer veterinarians who passed through La Palma were the protectors, the hands of daily care for rescued animals and with them all the companies that have collaborated at all levels: messaging, transfer of vehicles, drones, laboratories, distributors of veterinary products, zoological centers to which exotic or difficult-to-find species were taken and which supplied essential material at the beginning of the eruption.
The tribute, which recalled the support received from Veterinary Colleges throughout the State, especially that of Las Palmas, the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine of the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and the University of Gran Canaria itself, did not forget the institutions local authorities, both from the Cabildo de La Palma and from the municipalities of Tazacorte, Los Llanos de Aridane and El Paso, with special emphasis on the ministries and departments that had a special relevance in the work of veterinary volunteering.
