Good News Roundup - Friday 3rd July

In these uncertain times, we’re sharing our weekly round-up of positive things happening at Battersea, as well as heartwarming dog and cat stories from the UK and beyond. We know that animals can be a great source of comfort so we hope it adds a bit of cheer to your day.

Paul’s back!

We're delighted to announce that Paul O’Grady’s For The Love of Dogs will be returning to our screens on 15 July. Tune in to ITV at 8pm for a special hour-long episode with Paul and the gang, as they spend time with us during lockdown.

Robotic pets are a source of comfort to care home residents

When lockdown measures came into force earlier this year, a lot of our usual routines were disrupted. For one care home this meant that regular visits from therapy animals had to stop as the home closed its doors to all but essential visitors.

Seeing that the residents were missing these visits, staff at the care home enlisted the help of Bonzo the dog and Simba the cat. The robotic animals are very life-like, and for some residents even trigger happy memories of their own pets.

Bonzo and Simba respond to interaction when residents engage with them and staff say they are a great source of comfort and relaxation, helping with symptoms of anxiety as well as increasing social interaction.

We like it here and we think we’ll stick around

We’ve heard of taking work home with you, but these foster carers have taken it to the next level during lockdown. As the measures were introduced, hundreds of our staff and foster carers stepped up to take in animals to free up our centres for emergency cases, and to make sure we could keep being there for every dog and cat who needed us. As lockdown has eased we’ve been able to slowly start up rehoming again following government guidelines and these lucky pups decided they’d already found their new start and opted to stick around. Happy new homes to Mable, Sid and Milo!