Dogs, Cats Healing COVID-19 Loneliness in Japan

From Jiji Press

October 31 2021

TOKYO – Animal therapy, designed to heal people through contacts with animals, is spreading in Japan amid the COVID-19 crisis. 

A university in Tokyo has hosted a session to introduce therapy dogs to students and alleviate their loneliness attributed to the prolonged novel coronavirus crisis, while facilities for disabled people are developing environments that allow residents to live with animals.

On the campus of Showa Women’s University in Tokyo’s Setagaya Ward, in-person classes have resumed following the full lifting of the government’s COVID-19 state of emergency at the end of September.

“I feel at ease,” Manami Ubukata, 22, said with a smile as she rubbed the back of Eito, a therapy dog, at a hands-on session with such animals on Oct. 21.