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There are an estimated 3 million street dogs on the island of Sri Lanka, and a veterinarian based in the UK is trying to provide medical care to as many of them as she can.

UK vet Janey Lowes was backpacking around Sri Lanka in May 2014 when she was confronted with the plight of the street dogs. Every year, an estimated 26,000 are injured in traffic accidents, and thousands more get sick and die due to a lack of vaccinations and veterinary care.

Her first instinct was not to get them off the streets. Most of them are not true strays. They have humans who feed them, and they are pretty much accepted in Sri Lankan culture — just not housed.

What they truly needed more than anything else was veterinary care.

“I felt so helpless,” she told Metro.co.UK. “As a vet (and I’m sure many vets can relate) it was frustrating to be skilled enough to help but in another country with no equipment or supplies with me, or any idea of where to start with seeking help for dogs in need.”

Back home, and still thinking about how she could make an impact, she sought advice from her boss in the UK, who gave her £10,000 to set up a charity.

WECare Worldwide was born.

In 2014 she went back to Sri Lanka and teamed up with local vet Dr. Nuwan, a local volunteer named Malaka, and a tuk tuk driver, Chaminda, who she paid to drive them around looking for sick and injured dogs. Some she treated on the side of the road, others she brought to her home in Tallalla on the south coast for treatment.

“I started by working out where we could be the most helpful and have the biggest sustainable impact, which is hard when you are surrounded by need everywhere.”

By the end of the year, her organization was offering neutering and vaccination services to local villages.

By 2016, Janey’s house was overflowing with dogs and she rented an old school in a nearby village to continue her work.

A year later, though, money was running low and Janey was giving some thought to giving up.

Then WECare was featured in a BBC documentary and donations surged, allowing her to slowly build the clinic she works from today, which is one of the best equipped vet hospitals on the island.

Janey now has has 10 full-time and 12 part-time local staff, and also helps train other local vets, to improve vet standards across the board.

WECare treats dogs across the Southern Province, and also runs programmes in Arugam Bay on the east coast.

Locals can also bring their pet dogs in to the clinic for treatment at a reduced rate.

Neutering and vaccinations are free for both street and owned animals.

Janey sees a big distinction between street dogs and strays.

“There’s this generalization that people think it’s cruel for dogs to be on the street, that they don’t have cuddles every night, they don’t eat steak for dinner, they don’t get to go to doggy daycare – but it’s just different over here,” she explained. “They’re not stray dogs, so it’s not like in England where pet dogs are dumped on the street and left to die … These dogs have been on the streets for generations and generations, so to take them in to homes – to even take them indoors, most have never been indoors – is really quite stressful for them once they get to a certain age.

“They’re so happy beause they have their freedom. You can see them when they’re charging up and down the beach chasing each other, or when they’re on a mission in the morning to the nearest roti shop, you can see the joy in their eyes … We don’t believe in scooping up three million dogs to put them in a shelter because for street dogs, that’s like prison. Our job is to provide veterinary care and to let dogs be dogs.”

She admits that her mission a never-ending one and she sometimes gets disheartened. “But then you take a step back and look at how many dogs you’ve helped – which is about 6,000 dogs so far … I just go look at all the street dogs we’ve helped and remember that they would potentially have had a really slow, painful death if we hadn’t been around.”

WECare Worldwide operates on donations.

(Photos: Courtesy of WECare Worldwide)

Bethenny Frankel’s need for attention reached new heights over the weekend when she made and posted a video of her dog having a seizure, instead of trying to do anything about it.

The video shows the dog convulsing during what she described as a 45-minute seizure.

During most of the original video Frankel cried and shrieked: “Help me, what do we do? Help us … I don’t know what to do … Someone help me I don’t know what to do…”

“Do I take her to a vet? … What do I do?” she asked, wiping tears off her face. “My daughter’s watching this and we have to do something. The vet is 40 minutes away … I’m in a bad place.”

The reality TV star posted some additional videos after that, explaining that she felt there was no place to turn — except to her 1.5 million Instagram followers.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare everybody, but my daughter and I have been watching the dog have seizures for 45 minutes … The hospital is so far I don’t think we can make it.

“Anyone wondering why I’m doing this on social can fuck off, because all my friends are asleep … I’m freaking out. Why is this happening. I don’t think I can take this.”

Frankel shared the series of videos Saturday.

Later, she took her 17-year-old dog, Cookie, to a vet, where she died over the weekend.

Frankel issued a tweet about the death Monday: “My @cookiedabooboo is gone. Bless her furry heart.”

Frankel has appeared on “The Apprentice: Martha Stewart,” “The Real Housewives of New York City,” “Skating with the Stars,” and was the subject of the reality television series “Bethenny Ever After.” Her talk show, “Bethenny,” premiered in 2013 and was canceled in 2014. She also has written several books, and launched her own line of “Skinny Girl” meals. In 2009, she posed nude for a PETA billboard.

Clearly, she’s someone who loves being in the limelight, and is not above shining it on herself through social media.

This time, it was a pretty unflattering light she portrayed herself in — and it was downright revolting in the view of those who are left to wonder why her hysterics, and the self-made video, took precedence over her dog’s well-being.

I’m sure there are other singing veterinarians in the world — and that some of them might even serenade their ailing canine patients — but none are getting the kind of attention that has befallen Ross Henderson.

According to the Internet, he is “melting hearts” left and right, going viral and prompting females to check out his ring finger as he strums guitar chords to see if he might be available.

As this 9News broadcaster tells us, “Sorry, ladies, he’s married.”

(If that phrase sounds hopelessly old-fashioned and perhaps a bit sexist, remember I’m not saying it — I’m only paraphrasing the broadcaster.)

Anyway, Henderson is a veterinarian at Fox Hollow Animal Hospital in Lakewood, Colorado, and a part-time musician. He has been combining his passions for a while now — maybe not as scientifically as the musician we featured yesterday, but with apparent results.

(Do a YouTube search and you can find him singing a rap-style ode to the veterinary school he attended in Scotland.)

According to 9NEWS, Henderson often brings his guitar to work with him and will sit and sing to ailing or stressed out animals at the vet’s office. And, while I’m not sure how vital this is to the story, he is a strappy 6 foot 5.

Putting aside all the hyperbole about his hunkiness — he is reportedly making people on the Internet “weak-kneed” — I still have to say this is pretty cool, especially if he really is regularly taking time to serenade the dogs in his care, and that he’s doing it to further their comfort and recovery, as opposed to any desires he might have for a musical career.

Not that I’d wish him anything but the best in that as well.

You can see more of his music videos — many of them songs he has written for and about dogs — at 9NEWS.

Other than providing a urine and stool sample nearly as soon as he entered the exam room — neither of which had been requested — Jinjja’s first trip to the vet went more smoothly than I expected.

Despite all the fears I’d managed to come up with beforehand, we got in, we got out, we got microchipped (well, he did), and all with relative ease.

I’d worried, because of where he comes from — a dog farm in South Korea where dogs were raised for their meat — whether he would go in willingly. Would he react poorly to being poked and probed? Would he revert to the skittish and fearful dog he was when I got him nearly a month ago, or be the more sociable creature he has become when he met the veterinary staff?

And, given I’ve been warned not to pick him up, how would he react when lifted to the exam table?

Based on how he did, I can conclude he is in good health, he is continuing to become more social, and I worry too much.

The purpose of our visit was to have his microchip installed, and get a basic check-up. I’m still not certain — if he ever got out of the house without me — whether he’d hang around or take off on a perpetual squirrel hunting quest.

I adopted Jinjja from the Watauga Humane Society last month. I was advised to give him a couple of weeks just to get used to his new surroundings, and to not try to lift or move him around for a while.

It took two weeks to get him to jump in the back of my Jeep, but once he mastered that, I scheduled a visit with a vet.

Much as I liked Ace’s vet, I opted to go to a new one, and sidestep the painful memories of Ace being put down last year.

I’d been to Mt. Tabor Animal Hospital with a friend’s dogs and was impressed. On top of that, it’s right down the street from where I live now, and has separate entrances and lobbies for dog people and cat people.

I haven’t a clue on how Jinjja is with cats yet, but from afar they seem to drive him almost as bonkers as squirrels do.

Jinjja was a little excited in the waiting room, especially when he heard other dogs in the background. Once in the exam room, he immediately peed, then held off until the vet came in to present a healthy-sized poop.

He was friendly to both the vet tech and the vet, but both thought it best, given his background, to muzzle him while his temperature was taken (he didn’t like that at all) and when his microchip was inserted.

That was another thing I had worried about. Might being muzzled stress him out more, make him regress? But, once we got it on, it had the opposite effect, calming him at least for a while.

After weighing in at nearly 50 pounds, and posting a normal temperature, Jinjja met the vet, Jenny Bolden.

I’d requested a female veterinarian, because Jinjja seems less skittish around, and quicker to make friends with, that gender.

They hit if off and, with the push of a button, the vet sent the platform Jinjja was standing on rising into the air. (So much for my worry about lifting him.)

We decided to hold off on a heartworm test until his next visit, he was up on all the important vaccinations.

Dr. Bolden agreed with my opinion that, judging from his teeth, he looked a little older than just one, the age listed for him at the shelter. She guessed he could be as old as three, but pointed out that the less than pristine condition of his teeth could also be a result of whatever he was fed or foraged on while in captivity.

We also talked about his weight. He is stockier than the average Jindo, but my suspicion is that he has some chow in him, and that accounts for the bulkier torso he carries on his relatively spindly legs.

She suggested his ideal weight might be about five pounds lighter.

Dr. Bolden asked a lot of questions — always a good sign in a vet — about his background, the campaign to save dogs in Korean farms. And she patiently answered mine.

We remuzzled Jinjja for insertion of the microchip. During that process, which didn’t seem too bothersome to him, I squirmed much more than he did.

By the time we got home, he was exhausted and I was covered in shed hair, something he hasn’t seemed to do to excess. I guess stress can accelerate the hair shedding process.

Once I assured myself it wasn’t mine, I decided not to worry about it.

A home improvement store says a disabled vet and his service dog were “the best person for the job.”

So now you can find them, in matching employee vests, helping customers at the Lowe’s in Abilene.

Clay Luthy says he has had Charlotte since she was a puppy.

“She was never supposed to be a service dog. I found out a couple years ago she was alerting me and I didn’t even know it,” said Luthy, who always has Charlotte at his side at work.

“I was trying to figure out where I could go that would be a good fit and it wouldn’t mind having Charlotte, and my wife said I was at Lowe’s so much anyway, I might as well get a job there,” he told KIDY.

“We knew he was gonna make a great employee – we just got the benefit of getting Charlotte right along with him,” said Jay Fellers, Lowe’s human resources manager.

The duo has been getting some news coverage since Judy Dechert Rose, a customer at Lowe’s, posted the image online last week:

“This is a retired vet who struggled to get a job because he needs his service dog! Lowes hired them BOTH!!” she wrote.

Luthy, who served in the Air Force, said he was surprised when it went viral.

“By the time I looked at it, there was 1,000 comments on it. Oh my gosh, it was ridiculous,” he said.

It wasn’t the first Lowe’s to hire an employee AND his service dog.

Back in June, a Lowe’s in Saskatchewan was in the news for hiring Owen Lima and his dog Blue.

(Photo: Facebook)

There’s a new taxi service for dogs in the nation’s capital.

Launched earlier this month, Rapid Paws will transport your pooch (or cat) wherever he or she needs to go — be it vet, groomer, day care, airport, or even to another state.

The on-demand limousine service for animals has a fleet of two climate controlled, high-roofed vans, and they’re even equipped with cams should you want to check in and take a look as your dog gets from here to there.

Customers can schedule a a door-to-door pickup and local delivery to anywhere in Washington and its burbs, and they can do that by phone, via the Rapid Paws website, or through a smartphone app.

While the service may sound over the top, owner Paul Ozner says it’s filling a need.

“It’s an excessive service for some, in terms of basic necessities. But some of the people in this area, they’re time-constrained, and they do have pets. So what are you going to do? You have to treat them right,” he told the Washington Post.

So far, he said, most clients are middle aged professionals too busy to take off work to run their pet to the vet, or disabled, ill or elderly pet owners seeking a little help.

Rapid Paws has teamed up with one real estate company to transport the dogs or cats of people who are relocating.

Ozner said he and his partners came up with the idea based on their experience with a company that delivered meals to schools and the elderly.

Fares typically run from $25 to $60, depending on the length of the trip.

The potentially deadly strain of the dog flu that has sickened thousands of dogs nationwide has made its way to North Carolina.

Two dogs in Asheville and one dog in Winston-Salem were confirmed to have the H3N2 virus at the end of last week, and state officials suspect more than 200 dogs in the state may also be infected.

The confirmed case in Winston-Salem is that of a 10-year-old German shepherd that belongs to Dr. Sandra McAvoy of Abri Veterinary Hospital, the Winston-Salem Journal reported.

McAvoy believes Zalea might have gotten the virus from a dog she was fostering for the Forsyth County Humane Society.

The humane society closed its doors Thursday due to concerns about the virus and expects to remain closed for at least 10 days.

Most dogs recover from the sickness within two to three weeks, but secondary bacterial infections can develop and cause more severe illness and pneumonia.

Dog flu is not transmittable to humans, according to the Center for Disease Control. Humans can, however, spread it from an infected dog to an uninfected dog.

The symptoms include cough, runny nose and fever. Other signs can include lethargy, eye discharge, reduced appetite and low-grade fever, officials said.

The state is also testing samples from a cluster of dogs in Greensboro that are showing similar symptoms.

“All dogs are at risk because this is something new, they’ve never been exposed,” said McAvoy. “They don’t have any natural immunity to it. So it’s probably going to run a course and then down the road we’re going to have immune dogs, down the road we’re going to have vaccines so the dogs will be vaccinated and they won’t get it.”

As for Zalea, she’s recovering from pneumonia and McAvoy is hopeful she’ll to pull through.

Two percent of the dogs that have contracted the virus have died.

A state Agriculture Department website is tracking the cases, and features more information and resources for pet owners.

(Photo: Zalea, the German shepherd who was one of the first dogs in North Carolina to be diagnosed with the H3N2 virus; from 13NewsNow.com)