The phrase “no-kill” has been bantered about in many communities as the end goal in the game of tackling pet overpopulation. Few people, however, know what the term really means. Most people think it means the halting of all euthanasia of dogs and cats for good, but it’s meaning is quite different than that, depending on whether you are talking about a “no-kill shelter” or a ”no-kill community.”
Let’s start with a “no-kill shelter.” A no-kill shelter makes policy to not kill unwanted animals. In order to have this policy, the shelter does not accept every homeless pet that comes through its door. They turn pets away when there is no space to house them. They may also be selective in the animals they accept so as not to have to euthanize any of them. In fact, if they take in an unadoptable animal, they are committed to keeping that pet for its entire life if they can’t find a home, rather than euthanize it.
Thankfully, they can do this wonderful work because there are shelters in the community with an open door policy, which means a shelter accepts all unwanted animals. But open door shelters are in the undesirable position of having to euthanize because there is not enough room to house them all. Sadly, they are portrayed as the bad guys.
A “no-kill community” is different from a “no-kill shelter” because it actually involves euthanasia. As defined by the Maddie’s Fund, an organization dedicated to creating no-kill communities in the United States, a no-kill community is “a place where all healthy/adoptable and treatable animals are saved and where only non-rehabilitatable animals are euthanized.” (Of course, there are no-kill shelters that follow this definition and therefore do euthanize some pets.)
So officially, a no-kill community does not halt euthanasia; it only reserves it for those animals that are untreatable and unadoptable, most often because of aggression. It makes sense, but most people don’t realize what it means when they first encounter the term.
