A horrific hoarding case in Chicago is a reminder of why, despite any ill-founded "good" intentions, hoarding never results in a happy home—for anyone. It's absolutely vital to report all known or suspected cases of animal neglect or hoarding to authorities immediately.

Police reportedly found a mentally disabled 14-year-old boy dead in a backyard, wearing only a T-shirt. Inside the house, they allegedly found more than 200 animals—and three more sick children—living in filth and feces. Reportedly, all 109 cats in the house were suffering from feline AIDS and leukemia and had to be euthanized, and many other animals were starving and diseased, including a cockatiel whose spine was visible on his nearly featherless back. The children reportedly had never been to school or a doctor and slept on the floor, and their bare feet were caked with feces and dirt. The children's mother has been charged with child abuse and cruelty to animals, among other crimes.

Hoarders exist in virtually every community, so it's crucial to be alert to the signs of hoarding:

• Hearing animals but rarely seeing them—or seeing many different animals (especially cats) in the windows
• Windows kept closed with the shades always drawn, to hide the hoard
• Flies on the inside of windows
• Strong, persistent odors of waste and decay
• Homes that look abandoned from the outside—unkempt and unlived in
• Homeowners who refuse to open the door to visitors, instead meeting people outside
• Dogs with bacterial infections, bite wounds, and skin conditions, such as mange
• Yards that are overgrown, hiding the home 

If you notice red flags of animal hoarding, please don't hesitate—call the police. Hundreds of lives—both animals' and humans'—may be at stake.

Written by Lindsay Pollard-Post

BBC News has just released a list of the top 10 most controversial ads of 2007, and our edgy, boundary-pushing counterparts over in the UK made the list with their “Feeding Kids Meat Is Child Abuse” billboard, which received a whopping 68 complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority in 2007. The way I see it, with literally millions of advertisements bombarding the public every day with messages about how they can make their teeth whiter, or, like, more effectively pluck their eyebrows, creating an ad that makes people stop and think—and that affects some people so profoundly that they’re shocked out of their complacency—is not an easy thing to do. So, excellent work, PETA UK.

It may not be a message that people want to hear, but it’s an important one (a point that was recognized by the Advertising Standards Authority, which ruled that the ad does not trivialize abuse, as complainants had claimed). And, of course, when you consider that feeding kids meat sets them on the road to a higher risk of heart attacks, diabetes, and a whole slew of other health problems, the ad isn’t exactly misstating the case. Here’s the BBC list of controversial ads, and here’s the billboard that’s causing all the fuss. I’d love to hear what you think.