WHAT HAPPENS WHEN there are stray or abandoned dogs and cats roaming around the streets in the Philippines?
Chances are they'll be placed in pounds and while this may seem like a safe haven for them, the reality turns out to be the opposite.
Just ask Malou, the founder of PAWSsion Project.
"I started PAWSsion because of dogs on death row in Bacolod, where I am originally from. So I started with 50 dogs and they were for gunshot, and that's where I learned that gunshot is legal in the country, to kill dogs in pounds."
But that wasn't the only thing she discovered as she also learned more about the pounds in the country.
"So many pounds in the country don't have a budget so basically as for the law, if one doesn't get rescued or adopted, within three days to two weeks, they're going to be killed," she revealed in an exclusive with SPIN.ph.
"It's even awful to leave them to die by starvation, and again it's not even by euthanasia how they get killed kasi wala ngang budget. I mean some pounds have a budget but most of them do not, so they don't do the standard euthanasia to kill them."
She further explained: "Other pounds use gunshots, others use carbon monoxide, others that aren't really regulated use starvation. I've seen a lot of awful pounds and this is what really fuels me to get the word out because again people don't adopt kasi hindi nila alam na ito pala yung reality."
A call to action
Thus Malou's non-profit organization, PAWSsion Project, was born, tasked to rescue, rehabilitate, and rehome abused and abandoned animals.
Around 2,000 dogs and cats have already been rescued, and as of now, they have 700 rescues stationed in Bacolod and Bulacan.
"The ultimate vision is that the day will come where we don't have to rescue everyone because everyone is aware about the realities, everyone knows that they can actually adopt," started Malou.
"I think so many people do not know that there are shelters that they can go and adopt rescues from so many people who do know that there are pounds in the country."
Rescuing these animals is not easy task, especially with the sheer volume overwhelming Malou.
"It's a lot of work especially since we're nonprofit and we're really donations based, that we do a lot of fundraisers, we sell merch, everything, so we can raise funds for the rescues."
A PAWSsion project
It may seem like this is Malou's fulltime job as she handles a lot of strays, but it turns out that she works as a financial advisor and she's also the co-founder of Pet Aquamation in Taguig.
"I have a dayjob, all of us are volunteers, we all have dayjobs, we have students also so it's kinda hard to juggle everything but if we could do this for a living, we would quit our jobs and do this fulltime," she revealed.
"We're never tired to rescue because it's usually the awful reality around us. It really exhausts us but helping the rescues is like the most gratifying thing in the world."
When Malou first started her 'PAWSsion Project,' she didn't exactly know what to do, but the emotions she felt pushes her.
"I'm a marketing graduate and I have no vet(erinarian) background. It all started because I felt sorry for the dogs in the pounds. I said yes to saving them," she reflected.
And because of her backstory, Malou hopes to inspire the public that they too can answer the call to action.
"Everything I just learned through the process and the journey of just rehabilitating these rescues and hearing people inspired, so we want to help empower people to do more than just reporting, put compassion into action, if you see a stray dog, if you have extra food, you can feed them."
"I always encourage people to go to their local pound. I mean you feel so sorry at so many dogs you see on social media, go outside your houses, there are so many strays that are in need of help."
"Go see your local pound and assess how you can help your pound there, maybe adopt a dog and it will change your life and it will fuel you to speak up for the others who need help as well."
An expensive endeavor
As a nonprofit organization, Malou is dependent on the donations of the public, and these donations even come from bigtime corporations. Due to the level of donations, some would point out that they have the sufficient resources to sustain their operations.
But Malou would say otherwise.
"What's sad is that there are people who say na, 'O marami naman tumutulong sa kanila, hindi na natin tutulungan,' Like it's a never ending thing and whatever we have, we share it with other shelters. The more help we get, the more we're be able to do more for others."
Malou dug deep into her expenditures in saving these animals, where the org spends half a million on food per month, consisting of six sacks of dog food everyday, 600-700 kilos of meat per week, 6-7 sacks of rice a week.
Some dogs even have special needs where they need recovery or renal food, which costs around Php200 per meal.
To add to the burden, Malou and her team of volunteers would also cook the meals.
"People don't understand the responsibility of being a parent to one, imagine being a parent to 700+. So this is a shared responsbility," she reiterated.
But food supply isn't just the only thing that's eating their cash supply.
The heavy cost of rehabilitation
Before Malou could adopt animals and place them into shelters, she needs to make sure that the animals are free from unwanted contaminations, thus she spends a lot on vaccinations.
"Before taking the dog to the shelter, we spend thousands of tests so that we know where to put them for proper quarantine and isolation. All of our rescues are free roaming, meaning we spend so much to rehabilitate them and get them vaccinated , so imagine the amount of cost just to rehabilitate them," she revealed.
However some have it worse as they ended up suffering from the harshness of their environment. Malou then looked back at one hit-and-run incident.
"So much of the costs goes to med bills. One hit-and-run rescue, whenever I see a picture of a dog, I already know automatically na the surgery will cost us 50K. Orthopedic surgery is really expensive and not all can do it, there are specialists for ortho, especially since it's a spine problem."
"If it's a hit-and-run case and it's a spine, so it's automatic na they're a dog with a disability in life so they can't walk anymore. I know in some other countries, they euthanize it, but we have so many hit-and-run rescues who still lived a good quality of life after rehab."
And there have been other hit-and-run incidents like that time when she adopted Garen, whose eyes were about to exit the socket. Garen's previous owners didn't have the means to bring him to the vets, and Malou was forced to take action.
Garen is now completely blind as his eyes were already removed, but now he is living well in a shelter.
Then there are cases of animal cruelty as seen in the case of Jabo who had one of his eyes poked by a barbecue stick, and there were those who were abandoned like Wendy who was brought to the shelter in a paper bag with no fur.
And there have been a lot of cases where animals have been products of irresponsible breeding. Some breeders would falsify vaccination cards, where animals with parvovirus are sold to owners.
Raising awareness
As she champions her advocacy, Malou realized that the situation of animal welfare has improved. Recently she was invited in Manila Football League 2024 to spread more awareness to the community.
"For the past five yeas, I've noticed that animal welfare is slowly getting the help that it needs. More and more people are choosing to adopt instead of buying. And then we are so grateful that there are opportunities like this, that you wouldn't likely see, a nonprofit group for animals in a football event."
"People are becoming more aware, there are companies reaching out to us, to do CSR programs."
And while she is grateful for the opportunities given to her, the realities would still remain. As much as Malou would love to save the strays in the Philippines, she can only do so much.
"The reality is we cannot rescue all of them. There are more than 10 million strays in the country, everyday there are hundreds-thousands of dogs being killed in pounds, we can't save all of them."
How you can help?
In the end, it's all up to the community to do their part, especially since animals are in need of human compassion.
"Some of the people have been inspired by the work that we do, which also fuels us to keep going."
"Animals have always needed help and sila nga they're voiceless, never silang nanghihingi ng help."
For those who aspire to answer the call, PAWSsion Project has a sponsorship program where people can donate Php1,000 per month.
In addition, the org is open to accept volunteers.
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