my aunt adopted thrown away animals, often unhealthy or injured or crippled, and she did not believe in euthanasia so she relied on veterinarians in apparent excess. the context is: those animals would have been killed or abused more without her. she paid a great deal of money to save them - because others tested them poorly. 

at one point she had about 50 horses, she saved from a variety of abuse situations. she rehabilitated them and gave them sometime a decade of pasture life. sunny acres was a horse sanctuary. if you listen to my family, she was unstable and ridiculous and random, when in reality it was deliberate and efficient and ethical. she provided homes for pets abandoned. read that again.