2011 is World Veterinary Year

In the waning days of the 111th Congress, the House of Representatives followed in the Senate's footsteps by passing a resolution in early December marking the 250th anniversary of veterinary medicine and proclaiming 2011 as World Veterinary Year (see JAVMA, Aug. 15, 2010). 

Introduced by the two veterinarians elected to Congress—Sen. John Ensign of Nevada and Rep. Kurt Schrader of Oregon—the congressional proclamation acknowledges the valuable role veterinarians have played in society since the world's first veterinary school was established in Lyon, France, in 1761.