Today our baby sleeps in the cold ground. He was our littlest, last and only baby, and now he is gone. We took him to an emergency center three weeks ago, and they would not treat him because we were poor.
Our baby was not a human baby; God did not bless us with human children, but with a little black Pug. My wife begged them to treat him, even offering her diamond engagement ring (one of our few things of value). We gave them all the money we had, and it still wasn’t enough.
Our regular doctor treated him on Monday, but he died two weeks later anyway. It probably wasn’t their fault, after all. But they took all we had, and we lost all we had. Our doctor said it was probably cancer.
To all of you celebrities and animal lovers, why don’t you fund an emergency center where poor people can get help for their babies? There are foundations for homeless pets, the pound is now run by the Humane Society, but there is no haven for sick animals whose humans can’t afford to pay the extreme rates of emergency clinics. You shouldn’t need to be rich to save your pet.
It probably wasn’t their fault, after all, our doctor tells me. But our baby sleeps in the cold ground today, and they would not help because we couldn’t pay.
— Don Netherton
Asheville
