By Michele Brown | April 04, 2025
Vietnam: Dog Meat Market
Live dogs and cats are in full view to entice customers to buy their freshly slaughtered dog and cat meat. Terrified live animals are kept in iron cages in deplorable filth at the produce market in Mỹ Phước 2-Bến Cát-Bình Dương; an hour out of Saigon.
They sell live dogs and cats for slaughter on the spot, as well as freshly slaughtered dogs and cats for meat. The two slaughterhouses are located next door to each other.
Displaying cages of live animals on the pedestrian walkway does two things: (a) its an advertisement that the meat is freshly slaughtered and (b) it allows customers to choose a particular dog or cat and watch it slaughtered to guarantee freshness.
For dog and cat eaters watching the animal being brutally slaughtered is an appetite stimulant. Dogs and cat do not die quietly! They scream in terror and pain.
There is no humane way to slaughter dogs or cats for human consumption.
Cats Trapped In A Dog Meat Market
The lower middle picture (above) shows two cats caged to be slaughtered for cat meat. Their cage sits on top of live dogs in line to also be slaughtered for meat.
Cats have no voice in this environment. No one hears their yells for help. Their desperate pleas for help are drowned out by the sounds of equally desperate dogs. Piercing sounds of dogs yelping, screaming and barking are blood curdling as one by one each dog’s time arrives to be slaughtered.
The cat meat trade is extremely brutal for cats. They’re a solitary animal by nature. By instinct cats hide when frightened. There is no where to hide in an iron dog meat cage inside a dog meat slaughterhouse.
I’ve been saying it for decades: “Cats are the forgotten victims of the dog meat trade.”
In Conclusion
Millions of dogs and millions of cats are slaughtered each year in Vietnam. Most butchers are not interested in rescuers removing live dogs from them. The daily numbers of dogs and cats in slaughterhouses are way beyond what anyone can cope with.
Simply buying dogs and cats from butchers is not rescue. Rescue is what happens after they leave the slaughterhouse.
Dogs and cats need to be sterilized to prevent the never ending stream of unwanted litters. Dog and cat owners need to act responsible and keep their animals safe at all times. This means daily cleaned indoor kitty litter trays for cats and dogs on leashes for toilet times.
If you cannot act responsible then just don’t have a dog or cat.
Fight Dog Meat will continue our rescue, rehabilitation and adoption work, helping Vietnam’s animals in critical need. Turning away or sitting quietly does not end the hideous meat trade. FDM will keep exposing what these animals are forced to endure. Ultimately it’s the voice of the country’s own people whom their government will eventually be forced to listen to, for positive change for animals. It’s mid-year 2025 and still no animal protection laws for Vietnam. No excuses left.
Thank you for reading,
Michele Brown
Founder,
Fight Dog Meat
