That's one reason why the dogs still aren't allowed on buses or in restaurants. However, public antipathy toward the dogs remains widespread. But with my guide dog, I can enjoy relaxed outings." When I used a stick before, I sometimes bumped into things. "The biggest help provided by my guide dog is assisting me to avoid obstacles. "When you are used to walking with a guide dog, it is quite difficult to go back to using a simple walking stick," said Melinda Wei, a guide dog user for a year. What the public may not fully appreciate is how much visually impaired people swear by their dogs. It remains a mystery why Ersibin bolted from duty. The man who returned Ersibin to authorities said he found the dog on a roadside and it followed him home. The most well-known incident, perhaps, was one involving a Labrador named Ersibin, whose disappearance in 2012 stirred a lot of public attention.Įrsibin went missing from its owner's massage shop and wasn't found for four days. In fact, cases of missing guide dogs have occurred in Shanghai. Wang Chunsun teaches a guide dog to obey commands. "The cost is indeed high, but it's unfair to call guide dog training a 'fraud' because the users get the dogs absolutely for free," Wang told China News Weekly. Only half the dogs selected for the program graduate the rest are adopted out as pets. Costs cover staff salaries, dog food, training gear and medicines. The annual expense of the center, he said, was about 6.84 million yuan. Wang Jingyu, director of the China Guide Dog Training Center in Dalian, where Duosite was trained, told China News Weekly that the 200,000 yuan was the actual cost of several years of training, beginning when the dogs are puppies.Īccording to Wang, the center last year had 105 dogs in training and another 40 that had completed training. "What's the point of spending 200,000 yuan to train a guide dog if it is easily enticed away from its owner by a stranger?" he wrote. "A family would need to have at least one healthy member to take care of the dog, and the dogs are apparently in service for only six to eight years."Īnother netizen with the screen name Yaodaxian went straight to the nub of the debate. "The news reports said guide dogs are better than walking sticks, but they don't seem to be very economical or even widely used," Zhou Zhuocheng, an aquatic biologist, commented on the social platform Weibo. Many netizens were astonished by the cost of guide dogs and wondered if their services merited such an expense. The happy ending, however, didn't quell heated online discussion. Although guide dog Duosite was returned to her owner, her abduction continues to stir online debate.
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