Ricky Gervais (the dog) Has Died

A dog that was rescued by and named after Ricky Gervais has died, the Mirror is reporting.

The dog was named for Gervais because the comedian’s  tweet had helped to raise money to rescue sick dogs from a Romanian shelter where dogs were living in horrendous conditions. But a mere month after being rescued, little Ricky Gervais succumbed to a bad case of pneumonia and died. Gervais is a passionate animal advocate, and frequently uses his twitter to raise awareness about issues of animal cruelty.

Victoria Eisermann, the rescue worker who named the pup after Gervais said in a statement, “I took Ricky from Odai shelter 4 weeks ago now when I was out there delivering the emergency food (bought from money raised from Ricky Gervais tweet).  I saw her running around in the shelter, she was a beautiful tiny little vision of beauty. I picked her up and took her to Kola Kriola, a lovely shelter which is caring for the many sick puppies and dogs of Odai.  K-9 Angels were alerted just days ago that Ricky had pneumonia but we honestly thought she would pull through. Ricky looked happy and healthy and we had plans to find her a loving forever home. But yesterday Ricky died at the vet of a violent strain of the disease. We are all extremely upset. But we hope her death will help raise more money to help the hundreds of sick dogs at Odai and to raise awareness.”

Here’s Gervais’ tweet that helped to rescue

OK. That's The Emmys done. Now back to important stuff. Emergency food & aid for dogs at Odai public shelter, https://t.co/6PS5kSW8Mn pls RT

— Ricky Gervais (@rickygervais) September 21, 2015

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