Here’s a roundup of this week’s biggest news stories related to animal research—all the recent media coverage you need to know right now to be the most effective activist for animals in labs.
Hundreds of Physicians Rebuke Duke University for Killing Animals to Train Medical Students
Business Wire, 2/2/2024
“In a letter sent to Duke, 552 physicians are urging the university to halt the controversial practice of using and killing animals to train medical students.”
“ . . . no other medical school in the United States or Canada is known to kill animals to train students, and none has done so since 2016. Duke only reinstated the practice, in which invasive surgical procedures are performed on pigs, recently and has separately come under fire by medical training experts.” 📰 Full Story →
NEIGHBORS REJOICE: Decatur County Leaders Revoke Bond for Controversial Primate Facility
AJ Douglas, 2/2/2024
“County leaders are taking a step back when it comes to a controversial primate facility coming to Bainbridge[, Georgia] . . . The board moved to revoke the revenue bond for the project as a response to the community’s push back against the deal.”
“‘The divisiveness and polarization this community is experiencing now outweighs the economic advantages,’ according to the Bainbridge Industrial Development Authority chairman Keith Lyle.” 🎥📰 Full Story →
A Major UCLA Study Says That At Least 65 Species of Animals Laugh
Annie Reneau, 2/2/2024
“Laughter is one of the most natural impulses in humans . . . but we’re not the only creatures who communicate with giggles.”
“Researchers at UCLA have identified 65 species of animals who make ‘play vocalizations,’ or what we would consider laughter. Some of those vocalizations were already well documented–we’ve known for a while that apes and rats laugh—but others may come as a surprise. Along with a long list of primate species, domestic cows and dogs, foxes, seals, mongooses and three bird species are prone to laughter as well.” 📰 Full Story →
Is AI Anti-Animal?
Rise for Animals, 2/9/2024
Artificial intelligence (AI) is predicated entirely upon data entered by humans. This data, which reflects – and, indeed, is shaped by – humans’ “views and actions”, becomes a tremendous problem in a world like ours in which so many of these “views and actions” stem from prejudices.
AI’s grounding in human prejudices has been the subject of recent deep dives that have made the case for AI as a replicator, perpetuator, and normalizer of humankind’s “discriminatory patterns . . . such as sexism, classism, racism.” It should come as no surprise, then, that AI is also a replicator, perpetuator, and normalizer of speciesism. 📰 Full Story →
Scandal Involving Animal Research at University of Michigan Deepens With Another Journal Retraction
Steve Neavling, 2/2/2024
“The ongoing animal research controversy surrounding the University of Michigan has intensified after yet another article linked to a disgraced researcher has been retracted due to fabricated or falsified data.”
“In early January, Gastroenterology retracted an article published in 2009 about ‘visceral pain responses in rats’ after the University of Michigan raised concerns about falsified or fabricated data. It’s at least the ninth article connected to [Chung] Owyang that has been retracted in the past two years.”
“In a letter this week to the U.S Department of Health and Human Services’s Office of Research Integrity (ORI), SAEN points out that nearly $1.4 million in federal funds was used on the fraudulent research.” 📰 Full Story →
Congress Assails EPA Over ‘Disgusting’ Decision to Revive Chemical Animal Testing
Stephen Dinan, 2/5/2024
“Members of Congress are pressing the Environmental Protection Agency over its renewed support for animal testing and its backsliding on rabbits [who] were supposed to be retired, saying the government must find more humane ways to practice science.”
“The Trump administration put the EPA on a glide path toward severely curbing mammal testing by 2025 and phasing it out altogether by 2035. The bipartisan group of more than three dozen lawmakers . . . demanded to find out who canceled those plans.”
“‘The EPA’s continued use of animals through unnecessary chemical testing is disgusting,’ . . . ‘We know that chemical tests on animals don’t translate to humans; the EPA has admitted that for years.” 📰 Full Story →
Different Face, Same Evil: The U.S. Medical Device Industry
Rise for Animals, 2/7/2024
Both the drug and medical device industries are part and parcel of the animal research industry. But even in the anti-vivisection space, we can attest to there being significantly less discussion of the ills of the medical device industry, which exploits countless animals while growing faster and wielding more power than perhaps even the pharmaceutical industry. Perhaps we should have expected this – that greater financial and political power would translate into lesser interest in saving (or, really, not harming) lives, regardless of species.
Read about the ills of the medical device industry here: 📰 Full Story →