Hong Kong veterinary board pressed to improve service amid logjam of complaints

When Hongkonger Tara Fung brought her eight-month-old Munchkin cat, Yuen Yuen, to a clinic to get spayed in March 2025, she was told two hours later that her pet had died from an allergic reaction to a sedative.“Who would have thought she would go in and never come out … I never got to see her again,” she told the South China Morning Post.Fung pressed the clinic for explanations and surveillance footage but said she did not receive a proper reply.“The way the clinic’s vet and nurse answered our questions, their handling of the situation and the whole process was truly baffling. I strongly suspect that this incident was a case of medical malpractice,” she said.She lodged her complaint with the Veterinary Surgeons Board of Hong Kong (VSB), but the statutory body said it did not consider the case an instance of malpractice.“I felt very powerless,” Fung said. “But sadly, it seems pets aren’t treated as a big deal in Hong Kong. It feels like vets do not have to take it seriously, even if an animal dies during treatment.”