After 35 years serving local pets, the Adobe Animal Hospital in Santa Cruz will shut down for good today. A staff member explained that business has been suffering because of the recession; fewer pet owners can afford to bring their animals to the vet.
The Adobe Animal Hospital was especially popular because it offered low-cost veterinary services to its clients. These included not only cats and dogs. The clinic once did a brisk business treating horses, but fewer people are keeping horses these days because of the steep costs involved.
Among the people particularly concerned about the closure are the local SPCA and its affiliates. Throughout the county, pet owners have been abandoning their animals during the recession because they can no longer afford to keep them. Many of these have been picked up by the Animal Shelter Relief Rescue and brought to Adobe, where they were spayed and neutered at half price. The SPCA now fears that because of Adobe’s closure, even more animals will be abandoned, and that they will not be able to rescue them. Read more at ABC 7.
