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Family forced to euthanize dog after adoption
FOX 13’s Carla Bayron reports.
WINTER HAVEN, Fla. - A Lakeland family is devastated after they said they were forced to euthanize their sick puppy before Christmas.
They adopted the puppy from the Polk County Animal Control Shelter, which is run by the Polk County Sheriff's Office.
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What they're saying:
Within a week, 10-week-old Ozzy quickly became a part of Mike Cole's family.
"He was a really friendly dog," said Cole. "He'd lean against you and put his head on your leg. He tried; he really did try. It was his personality coming through."
Cole and his wife adopted Ozzy from the Polk County Animal Control Shelter in Winter Haven during their free adoption event on Saturday, December 13. After he was neutered at the shelter, they quickly noticed he wasn't behaving normally.
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"Went to get him, and he was kind of a little lethargic for a 10-week-old puppy," he said. "Wasn't really playing or being like a puppy."
Cole said he took Ozzy to their family vet who told him the puppy had a lung infection. He was given a shot of antibiotics, but he just got worse after that.
"She said his right lung filled up, and it was supposed to be black, and it was totally white. What that was the buildup in his lungs," he said.
Putting him in a pet hospital would've cost between $15,000 to $20,000 with no guarantee he'd get better, so they had to make the difficult decision to put him down.
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"How many people have kids that they adopted dogs for their kids for the Christmas holidays, and they get a sick dog," said Cole. "Now, you have a five, six-year-old kid who doesn't understand about dogs dying and going to puppy heaven and they gotta put their dogs down."
The other side:
A spokesperson for the Polk County Sheriff's Office told FOX 13 in part: "...the health of our intake animals is assessed and monitored several times throughout the intake, examination, and adoption process... Any animal exhibiting symptoms of an illness or injury are immediately routed to the veterinary team for further assessment, treatment and quarantine...PCAC does not knowingly permit the public to adopt sick animals."
Lastly, the spokesperson added: "In this case, the husband of the adopter told us today that they noted significant wheezing four days after the adoption. Although we were not notified of the illness at that time, Animal Control would have accepted the dog back."
Cole said the loss has hit his family hard.
"I get that there's a lot of dogs, and they have to cram them in, but separate the sick ones," he said.
The sheriff's office spokesperson added there's no viral infection outbreak at the shelter.
The Source: The information in this story was gathered by FOX 13's Carla Bayron during an interview with Mike Cole, whose family adopted the puppy, and a statement from the Polk County Sheriff's Office, which runs the Polk County Animal Control Shelter.