Should probably mention that the province of Alberta has service dog identification cards that show the handler and the dog are recognized by the government and the dog has presumably been trained at a proper location

Canadian law says that emotional support animals are (obviously) not service dogs and ESAs generally have like no rights in Canada

For ESAs people need a doctors note of some sort that says they have a genuine need for an ESA that’s listed in the DSM-IV. The letter also needs to say they’re your doctor and needs information on the doctor’s license as well. If the flight is a domestic canadian flight with Canadians taking the dog then the practitioner needs to be situated in Canada. Also, according to Air Canada, only dogs count as emotional support animals

Service Animals need to be “certified and professionally trained” as well as harnessed and needs certification from a “professional service animal institution”.

I understand where you are coming from and it makes logical sense to look at the science, however, in this case we are looking at the law. The Air Carriers Access Act ACAA is the law that the Department of Transportation DOT is interpretting with its regulations. The ACAA does not directly address the service animal issue. It simply states that air carriers cannot discriminate against passengers with disabilities, must provide said passengers with reasonable accommodations unless the accommodation poses a safety or health risk to others or poses an undue hardship on the air carrier. This has been interpreted to mean that people with disabilities who have a service animal should be allowed to fly with that animal.

If I apply your thoughts to this law it would mean that not all people with disabilities would be treated equally. Not necessarily a bad thing. The definition of disability in the ADA is extremely broad. There are something like 292 disabilities out there. It would be a reasonable accommodation for a person with a disability that requires a service animal, an animal that performs an assistive task for that person, to travel with said animal. However, it would not be reasonable to accommodate people with disabilities who have ESAs that do not perform a task but only provide emotional support. The risk to reward balancing might support this argument, but I’m not sure the science would. While the science can’t prove the benefit of having an ESA, I’m not sure if there have been any studies done showing the benefit of a service animal except through observation and surveys. If we are basing our arguments on science it seems to me that we are comparing apples to oranges. This is why I lean more towards allowing service animals and ESAs, as long as they are well behaved.

I think that addressing behavior is the way to get around the threat to safety of others that the air carriers are concerned with. I think it would get really tricky to legally argue that some threats to safety are more acceptable than others. Furthermore, there would be people with ESAs claiming discrimination based on the type of disability they have. Why should they be discriminated against if their ESA can be shown to be as safe as other service animals?

I do agree that it seems like a lot of people are using this as a backdoor way to be able to travel with their pets. This is unfortunate and selfish. In my opinion.

Great points though about the science and thank you for making me think through the legal type arguments. I’m sorry if I’m boring you with the legalities lol

I think you may be onto something. Maybe the schools that provide service animals could be accredited and any animal graduating from an accredited school could receive proper credentials. There should be an authority responsible for making sure the schools are using the best practices in training.

That same authority should provide a field agent for anyone who has trained their own animal and who would like to receive the proper credentials. Like I said I don’t want to take away the right to train your own animal. There are people out there who are capable of doing so and do it beautifully. Also, why force someone to get a new animal if the one they have is capable and willing to do the work. Forcing a person to get a new dog from a school would be an unnecessary burden for that person, in time and expense. A person has to invest 3 and a half weeks at a school to learn to work with a new service animal, and the cost of food and vet visits for an additional animal might be too much for that person to manage. Not to mention travel issues if that person ever wanted to travel with their pet and service animal. I know someone who used to have to fly his retired service dog home then go back to get his working service dog and fly again.

I disagree with a standard curriculum. I think that results are more important than the content of the training. As long as the training is done humanely.

Maybe there ought to be some kind of program the handler has to complete. That way we can be confident that the handler will have some idea how to act in different situations. They will know how to advocate fro themselves and thus be less stressed when facing a difficult situation. Animals pick up on the stress and fear of their handler and the more we can do to put the handler at ease the more likely the animal will be at ease.

There are definitely schools that provide animals for the deaf and hard of hearing, and for seizures. I’m not sure about psychiatric service animals.

And yes we have to filter out the selfish snowflakes that ruin it for everyone else.

I love rantings of internet strangers!!! I wish that we didn’t constantly have to preface things with phrases like, this is just my subjective opinion, or, I’m not saying this to be a jerk. I understand that it is hard to relay tone in text and it is always safer to clarify, but i wish we could all give each other the benefit of the doubt more often.

You make good points. I will definitely keep thinking on my decision. I am an animal person and currently have two little dogs so poop doesn’t bother me much anymore. Lol There are definitely drawbacks to a dog as opposed to a cane. Such as the time investment and the expense, and the people that don’t like dogs or that are allergic to them. I am definitely aware of situations where people have been discriminated against because they had a dog with them.

You also make a good point about the insecurities that blindness can bring. I agree that ultimately the person with the disability has to be comfortable in their own skin, but I also think that a dog can help you get to that place. Kind of like a mix of a service animal and an emotional support animal. However, if the person doesn’t continue to put in the work to gain confidence and thinks the dog will be a magic cure all that won’t work well either.

Thank you for contributing to the conversation! You’re comments and opinions are well received and I will keep them in mind as I continue to think about my decision!

That is understandable, however, if they had a licensing system in place it could be as easy as showing your certification with your ID when going through security. Granted that is if the government had one central body to certify SAs PSAs, and ESAs. Would that change your opinion at all?

Also, without some sort of certification how could we weed out the fake ESAs? Should ESAs simply be denied across the board?

To a point that someone else made on this thread, would you not feel better having a certification that no one could refute?

Genuinely interested in your opinion ☺️