Hong Kong guide dog centre runs out of foster families for puppies as residents emigrate or stop working from home
- Seeing Eye Dog Services needs volunteers to take in pups and help them get used to living with people
- City could have more foster families for pups if not for ban on pets at many private housing estates
Hongkonger Karen Wong Ka-wai felt bittersweet about starting a new job because it meant she had to stop fostering a guide dog puppy.
Married with two children aged 12 and 13, she said being an airline project manager meant she could no longer work from home like she did in her previous job during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Wong, 38, who took in four puppies between 2020 and last year, said: “Fostering guide dog puppies has been a memorable experience because my husband and I are doing something meaningful to help people who cannot see. It also showed our kids that we need to help others.”
Meicy Choi Hiu-yan, a puppy walker officer with Hong Kong Seeing Eye Dog Services, said the wave of emigration from the city and the end of remote working arrangements resulted in fewer people applying to foster the animals.
There are currently about 50 guide dogs in use in Hong Kong. The charity estimates that at least 1,900 are needed, given the city is home to 190,000 people with visual impairments.
The charity opened the city’s first guide dog training school last December, and its first litter of seven locally bred labradoodle puppies was born the same month.
“It is ironic because now we have the facilities to train and breed guide dogs, but we lack foster families,” Choi said.
