- LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Dog gone? The city of Los Angeles wants to
help find Fido by implanting a microchip under its skin. It will do the
same thing for your cat.
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- In a city housing the world's best-known
pet cemetery, the council Wednesday added a new service for animal lovers.
The council approved a pilot scheme to implant tiny identification microchips
to be placed between the shoulders of a cat or dog adopted from one of
the city's pet shelters.
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- The city will recover the cost of the
chips by raising shelter adoption fees from $74 to $89 for dogs and from
$50 to $65 for cats.
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- The city council voted 13-1 to adopt
the two-year pilot program under which any pet adopted from a city shelter
would have the microchip implanted in the skin giving details of its owner.
If the animal got lost and was picked up by the city, it could be scanned,
like groceries at the supermarket, and the owner located.
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- ``We do hope to increase (the return)
of owned pets to their owners and to cut down on euthanasia and the heartbreak
of somebody coming too late to pick up their pet and finding it's already
been adopted by someone else or that it's been euthanized,'' said Sharon
Morris, interim manager of the city's Animal Services.
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