Meet the sanctuaries helping to give animals a second chance at life

Increased animal suffering means the ISPCA received more than 21,000 calls in a year, writes Rita de Brún

They come in their droves: The ill-treated, the abandoned, the lost and the stray. Some walk, some are carried; no story’s the same.

However, the fact that our animal sanctuaries are full of them reflects an unsavoury underside of Irish life: the infliction of suffering and despair on the helpless creatures whose silent trust behoves us to care for or do them no harm.