Lana Chapman’s heart broke the first time she spotted Cindy lying in the dirt outside a 7-Eleven, so fat she could barely move.
In a heartbeat, Chapman decided to take the scraggly dog in.
She never dreamed that decision would inspire total strangers to donate close to $50,000 to help Cindy.
An Australian living on the island of Koh Samui, Thailand, Chapman has been helping local street dogs for years and was determined to give Cindy a better life.
Weighing in at almost 45 kilos, Cindy had to lose weight and take daily thyroid medication before she was able to live a normal life.
Chapman shared Cindy’s progress online, where she went viral, and thought the sweet stray’s health was in a good place when she suddenly stopped eating a few weeks ago.
“Usually she runs around the house with excitement [but] it took her about two minutes before she started to eat. That was really out of the norm,” Chapman told 9news.com.au.
There were also strange lumps on Cindy’s neck and after a few vet visits she was diagnosed with lymphoma, a common cancer in dogs.
“We started chemo the same day,” Chapman said.
“It was awful as the vet didn’t think she would live for four weeks, but we wanted to try anything we could to help her.”
Initial tests alone cost almost $2,500 and vets warned Chapman that Cindy would need at least 19 weeks of chemotherapy to survive.
In her mind’s eye, Chapman saw the vet bills piling up and knew she’d never be able to afford them without help.
Pet insurance wasn’t an option as Chapman said most vets on the island of Koh Samui don’t accept insurance claims.
Betting on the kindness of strangers, she started a GoFundMe in Cindy’s name asking for $10,000 to help cover her care.
“$10,000 still wouldn’t cover the costs but I thought it would really assist us,” she said.
Seeing almost $50,000 flow in for Cindy in a matter of days was simply “mind-blowing”.
“People have been following her from the day she was rescued off the streets so they have a major soft spot for her,” Chapman said.
“We definitely would have struggled to pay for this [without donations].”
Research shows that Australians are increasingly willing to spend big bucks on vet care for their pets.
Younger Aussies are willing to fork out even more, with Gen Z owners happy to pay almost $15,000 to save their pet’s life.
People are also increasingly willing to donate money to help other people’s pets; more than 221,000 GoFundMe fundraisers were established for animal-related causes in in 2023 alone.
Chapman had hoped people who knew Cindy’s story would donate to her care but never imagined so many strangers would hand over their hard-earned cash to help her dog.
Now she’s hoping the almost $50,000 in donations will cover all of Cindy’s cancer treatment with some cash left over to help other street dogs on the island.
Chapman’s been paying for vet care and emergency treatment for the local dogs out of her own pocket for years and wants to keep helping the estimated 1 million stray dogs in Thailand.
Here in Australia, many owners rely on pet insurance to help with vet bills and the average cost of a pet insurance policy sits at around $1,233 annually.
