How many service animals are in the US?

Answer 1

There are too many programs and independent trainers to accurately count how many guide dogs are in place in the United States.

However, the Seeing Eye, the most recognized program in the world that trains guide dogs has reported in their 2007 annual report that they had 1,760 graduate teams in the field. Note that not all guide dogs are trained by the Seeing Eye. There are many programs that train guide dogs, but only those trained at the Seeing Eye are properly called "Seeing Eye dogs."

It is estimated there are about 20,000 Service Dog users in the US.

The Seeing Eye graduated 60 new dogs in 2009.

Roughly 1,500-2,000 Service dogs graduate each year,

about 150-200 of those for the blind.

Answer 2

A Service Dog is defined in the Americans With Disabilities Act as "Service animals are defined as dogs that are individually trained to do work or perform tasks for people with disabilities. Examples of such work or tasks include guiding people who are blind, alerting people who are deaf, pulling a wheelchair, alerting and protecting a person who is having a seizure, reminding a person with mental illness to take prescribed medications, calming a person with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) during an anxiety attack, or performing other duties. Service animals are working animals, not pets. The work or task a dog has been trained to provide must be directly related to the person's disability. Dogs whose sole function is to provide comfort or emotional support do not qualify as service animals under the ADA.

Federal law does not put a limit on the number of service dogs (I have known people who use two simultaneously) but the ADA also talks about reasonable accommodations. It is completely reasonable to to accommodate a person with one service dog. It not NOT reasonable to for a person with five service dogs (which I would not believe are real service dogs, no one needs 5 service dogs) to expect the same accommodations.