Dog days? In Italy, count them like family sick days

ROME (AP) - An Italian librarian who says her English setter is her family has won the right from her employer to use family sick leave to care for her ailing pet instead of having to use vacation days.

Italian animal advocacy group LAV says it helped persuade public La Sapienza University to let her use two days' family sick leave to care for 12-year-old Cucciola.

LAV president Gianluca Felicetti says in a statement that anyone who obtains a veterinarian's certificate should enjoy the same benefit, citing Cucciola's case as precedent.

The woman said Cucciola is recovering well from surgery for a breast tumor and a larynx problem. The woman, who is single and has no family help for Cucciola, declined to be identified. She had adopted Cucciola, found abandoned in a Rome park.