Paper short abstract:

While palliative care is routinely offered to human patients in the UK, the normative treatment for terminally ill or seriously injured animals is euthanasia. This paper details the experiences of informants who challenged veterinary advice and sought alternatives to euthanasia for their nonhuman companions.

Paper long abstract:

The success of the One Health movement falters in the face of death or more specifically in relation to the division between what Butler has termed 'grievable' and 'ungrievable' lives. Nonhuman lives are ungrievable because they are not accorded the same legal protection as human lives. While palliative care is routinely offered to human patients in the UK, the converse is true for animals. Moreover, a recent poll of UK vets conducted by the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons found that only 28% of those surveyed felt that hospice care should become a standard part of veterinary practice. Euthanasia is widely accepted by members of the profession (as well as legislative bodies and animal welfare organisations) as the appropriate course of action for terminally ill or seriously injured patients. Yet many human clients, for a variety of reasons (including ethical, religious, emotional) do not agree with euthanasia. These individuals often have to ague with consulting vets to overturn recommendations of euthanasia and obtain clinical support for palliative care, natural death or high-risk treatments. This paper details some of the experiences of human informants based in various locations in the UK who chose to challenge veterinary advice and seek alternatives to euthanasia for their nonhuman companions in both end of life and palliative contexts. Their experiences and some of the outcomes of their decisions provide grounds for challenging the normative status of euthanasia and encouraging the UK veterinary profession to consider hospice care more seriously.