The Kennel Club launches new Health Standard
The 'Find a Puppy' search page will prioritise litters which meet the new Health Standard.
The Kennel Club is to introduce a number of initiatives designed to support breeders with best practice across a wide range of registrations.
This includes its new Health Standard, launched on 15 January, which is designed to promote breed-relevant health testing for dog breeders.
The new initiatives have been motivated by statistics revealing that 80 per cent of breeders were breeding one litter a year. The Kennel Club says this highlights a need to provide better support and resources for breeders of every experience level.
The Health Standard has been developed using scientific research and breed community input, such as breed health coordinators. It is accompanied by steps to promote good practice and increase uptake of health testing before breeding.
A priority level has been assigned to the health test, which has been simplified into two categories: ‘good practice’ and ‘best practice’.
The Kennel Club says that these priority levels are informed by data collected over the past decade from Breed Health and Conservation Plans. These prioritisations could change as new evidence about diseases emerge.
The Health Standard is available on The Kennel Club website as well as on customer’s online accounts.
The organisation will be signposting breeders who use the new Health Standard on its enhanced Find a Puppy listing page. Based on how well they meet the Health Standard, including the health testing that has been carried out, litters of puppies will be prioritised on the search.
Litters following best and good practice will be top of the list, then those following good practice, and then those that had undertaken health tests but not met good practice.
Bill Lambert, who is health, welfare and breeder services executive at The Kennel Club, said: “At the heart of these new initiatives is our commitment to seeing the best practice shown by Assured Breeders adopted by a greater number of breeders.
“We want to see everybody registering with The Kennel Club supported to breed responsibly and making the best choices for their dogs.”
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