Royal Melbourne Children's Hospital welcomes meerkats!!!

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Jabiru96

Well-Known Member
Sky News: Children's hospital welcomes meerkats

Children's hospital welcomes meerkats
Updated: 02:51, Sunday October 16, 2011

A meerkat enclosure at Melbourne's new $1 billion Royal Children Hospital is unveiled.

And that's one good reason why they'll be right at home in an enclosure at the new Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne.

Zoos Victoria CEO Jenny Gray was on hand to welcome nine meerkats to their new enclosure as part of the latest unveiling at the $1 billion development to be opened by Queen Elizabeth on October 26.

Ms Gray said the meerkats - six males and three females previously from the zoo - would now be an important part of the hospital's team.

She said these tiny creatures of the desert very much depend on each other for survival in what is often a harsh environment with many predators.

The hospital will now depend on them to help patients and their families temporarily escape to a fun place.

Anyone that has encountered these cute creatures at a zoo would know it is thoroughly entertaining to watch them at play, grooming each other, play fighting and generally mucking around.

'When you stop and spend a little bit of time looking at meerkats you can't help yourself, you start to smile,' Ms Gray said.

'We truly hope that some of this precious meerkat magic is going to rub off in this important place and help patients recover as quickly as they possibly can.'

The meerkat enclosure is located in the outpatients area and is believed to be the world's first live animal exhibit at a hospital.

It was included to compliment the new hospital's use of nature to help in the healing process.

Other examples of this theme is a spectacular two-level coral reef aquarium that greets people as they enter the hospital, murals of animals and an indoor garden with synthetic grass, plants and trees.

Health Minister David Davis was at Saturday's unveiling and said not only had the new hospital been delivered on time and on budget, but also with great 'panache'.

He said the meerkat enclosure was an example of this.

'The display of the meerkats is simply wonderful for children,' he said.

'It will undoubtedly serve to highlight, distract and entertain and encourage children at what is often a difficult time.'
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There is a video in the link.
 
Wow! Intriguing!

I always believed that the strict State and Federal laws in Australia prohibited "non-zoos" (for want of a better term) from posessing exotic mammals such as these.
Is this the thin end of the wedge? I wonder what sort of permit the hospital needed?
 
I love this bit:

The meerkat enclosure is located in the outpatients area and is believed to be the world's first live animal exhibit at a hospital.
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Followed by:

Other examples of this theme is a spectacular two-level coral reef aquarium that greets people as they enter the hospital, murals of animals and an indoor garden with synthetic grass, plants and trees.
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A coral reef aquarium with no live animals, then?? More 'fish (and inverts) aren't proper animals' elitism! Boo! :D


Interesting idea though.
 
The hospital is yet to open and the aquarium yet to be stocked, Maguari. :)

Ara - the meerkats are still part of the Zoo's collection. The hospital is about a 300 metre walk from the zoo across a park. Zoo staff will continue to care for the meerkats and presumably the other smaller live exhibits. I'm guessing the massive marine tank will probably be similarly cared for by Melbourne Aquarium staff. I also don't believe it will be a 'reef tank' - not at the size mentioned. Just chalk that one up to limited comprehension of aquarium terminology by journalists.
 
Well I remember a large fishpond at the Heath Hospital in Cardiff in 1979, it was half in and half out of the outpatient area and the fish were definitely alive.
That said, I'll swap our waiting-room fish tank for some meerkats any day.
 
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Jabiru96 said:
Sky News: Children's hospital welcomes meerkats
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This seems very innovative. I have seen fish tanks in medical settings and I know that some hospitals, senior care centers, etc. have regular visits from dogs, but this is the first time that I've ever heard of a "zoo animal" exhibit in a hospital.

Maybe this is a potential new role that more zoos will be encouraged to expand into if this experiment works out.
 
DavidBrown said:
This seems very innovative. I have seen fish tanks in medical settings and I know that some hospitals, senior care centers, etc. have regular visits from dogs, but this is the first time that I've ever heard of a "zoo animal" exhibit in a hospital.

Maybe this is a potential new role that more zoos will be encouraged to expand into if this experiment works out.
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There has been some criticism, unsurprisingly, that the hospital is spending too much money on animal exhibits. The project is costing $A1billion, and only increasing the number of beds over the existing children's hospital by about 50 or so. As eagerly as I am anticipating going to see the aquarium in particular, I can understand the argument that it doesn't need to be quite so big.
 
Has anybody visited the meerkats at the hospital and/or know how the experiment of having a zoo animal exhibit there is working out?
 
nanoboy said:
That's a fairly random thing to ask. :p Is that fever acting up?
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nope, because I have been doing nothing today -- my rest day -- I spent my time working on updates of CGSwans' Exotic Mammals in Australian Zoos.
 
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