Nearly every seat was filled at the Edmonds Theater Saturday afternoon for a screening and panel discussion of the award-winning documentary War Tails, which chronicles the homeless pet problem in Ukraine following the Russian invasion in February 2022.

The film was spearheaded by Edmonds' own Tana Axtelle and Dan Fine, who spent the month of April 2022 caring for animals in a Polish veterinary clinic, just a few miles from the Ukrainian border. Fine returned several more times to the war-torn area, and eventually the two founded the Ukraine War Animal Relief Fund (UWARF) to generate support for the effort.

The documentary was created to highlight the work of dedicated veterinarians, vet techs and animal rescue volunteers working tirelessly to save the abandoned animals. With the threat of rabies and pet overpopulation looming, this includes rounding up stray animals, vaccinating them, and spaying or neutering them.

Saturday's panel discussion included a special guest: War Tails star Krystina Drahomarestska, who is visiting the U.S. from Ukraine. In addition to touring the Seattle area with Fine and Axtelle, Drahomarestska was interviewed by CNN's Kim Brunhuber early Saturday morning about the extent of the homeless pet problem in Ukraine and her efforts there.

Drahomarestska is seen throughout War Tails rescuing animals during challenging circumstances. She's been bitten numerous times, was treated for rabies after caring for a dog that later died of the disease, and was hit in the leg by a shell fragment from a Russian drone strike while protecting a dog she had rescued. She explained to the Edmonds Theater audience that she worked as an architect before the war, but began volunteering to rescue animals because "I saw a need and wanted to make a difference."

"I've always like to protect someone who isn't strong because I think I'm strong," Drahomarestska said. "That's why I chose animals."

An estimated 8 million people fled Ukraine after the Russian invasion began, and most of them had to leave their pets behind. According to Fine, the statistics show that an initial litter of five dogs will become 67,000 dogs within five years. "Cats are worse -- they [reproduce] faster," Fine said.

UWARF started out with an ambitious goal to vaccinate and sterilize 500,000 dogs, but "it's too much for us to handle, we can't do half a million dogs on our own," Fine said. "We don't have the money and the resources to do that ourselves."

The solution, Fine said, is to convince the European Union's Animal Welfare Unit to prioritize the issue immediately. Ukraine is not yet a member of the European Union, but animals are crossing the border from Ukraine into EU-member countries. "And so they are going to spread rabies into Eastern Europe," Fine said. "Not many people know about it. That's why we need to spread the word and get something done about it now."

Fine and Axtelle are asking supporters to send an email to Dr. Andrea Gavinelli from the European Union that encourages the EU "to consider providing the necessary support and resources to Ukrainian veterinarians." A email with sample language can be found here. "If they wait too long and when the war is over and we go to rebuild Ukraine...they're not going to be able to do it with all these rabid dogs and cats," Fine said. The next step would be a culling -- essentially killing all the affected animals -- "which would be the largest in history," he added.

"This is a problem that we can actually solve pretty easily," Fine said. "There's several hundred unemployed Ukranian veterans because of the war and they're willing to work. We just need to convince someone like the EU or WHO (World Health Organization) or the UN (United Nations) to do this."

Someone in the audience asked about the possibility of administering oral rabies vaccines to the animals. Fine replied that isn't a possible in areas where there is no refrigeration, land mines and include "Russian soliders with guns in the woods."

"We've got to physically vaccinate dogs and cats," he said.

Fine also disclosed that he is undergoing treatment for cancer, and that prevents him from returning to his animal rescue work. Instead, he told the audience he has been focusing on ways to raise funds and develop partnerships.

"It's not as easy as you think. Some people are like, 'Just call Bill Gates...or Taylor Swift," he said to audience laughter. "Look, I've tried."

He noted that UWARF created a partnership with Humane Society International and sought partnerships with non-governmental organizations to help. "They're not allowed to go into Ukraine because of insurance," Fine said. "If one of their employees goes in and steps on a land mine -- which I almost did -- and takes a leg off, they're going to sue for millions of dollars."

Fine also explained that the wartime situation involving pets in Ukraine is unique. "We haven't heard of this in other wars -- Afghanistan, Syria and Gaza," he said. Ukraine has a large pet population and the sterilization rate of animals in Ukraine was low before the Russian invasion -- 36% versus a 70% to 80% rate in U.S., he said. When the war started, Ukraine had to shut down many of its the free clinics for pet sterilization -- and the rate is now at 10%. As for rabies, that rate is at least doubling annually among animals in Ukraine, he said.

"It's going to be a long-term process but we have to convince the EU it's better to do this now," Fine said. "If you fix it now it's going to be a little problem, if you fix it later it's going to be a much, much worse problem."

Fine has also been focused on distributing the documentary, entering it in several film festivals worldwide. War Tails won the Seattle Film Festival Audience Choice and Filmmaker's Awards and it was a finalist at the Cambridge Film Festival. Fine has sent the film to PBS and to Netflix for distribution, but so far has had no takers.

"Once it finishes the film festivals, if we don't get it distributed, we'll put it up on YouTube and pray for the best," he said.