Here’s a roundup of last 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.
Are Ridglan’s Dogs Being Misclassified? We Demand Answers.
Rise for Animals, 5/6/2025
We at Rise for Animals and our friends at The Marty Project are urging the USDA to investigate Wisconsin’s massive dog-breeding-and-research entity Ridglan Farms for potentially misclassifying dogs and evading animal welfare laws. 📰 Full Story →
Sunscreen Controversy May Reveal If FDA Roadmap Is Real
Rise for Animals, 5/8/2025
The FDA says it’s phasing out animal testing — but actions speak louder than roadmaps. Now, it’s demanding new animal tests on sunscreen ingredients that have been safely used by humans for decades. This controversy could expose whether the FDA is truly modernizing or just protecting an outdated system. 📰 Full Story →
Trump administration sends $4.1 million for Monkey Island despite efforts to slash federal spending
Marilyn W. Thompson & Mitchell Black, The Post and Courier, 5/2/2025
“The disbursement from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease went through in March even as the agency prepared for massive cutbacks. The Trump administration in early April ordered federal health agencies to eliminate billions of dollars in contract spending.”
“The contract to Alpha Genesis of Yemassee funds a controversial breeding group at Morgan Island, colloquially known as Monkey Island . . . A watchdog group . . . said it was alarmed that NIAID, a division of the [NIH], fulfilled the Alpha Genesis contract despite Trump’s demand for cuts. ‘The NIH either didn’t get Trump’s memo–or they’re ignoring it–and continuing to strand monkeys and money on this taxpayer-funded island and in labs around the world,’….” 📰 Full Story →
Fort Collins animal research lab cited for 11 federal animal welfare violations
Sady Swanson, Coloradoan, 5/2/2025
Red Beast Enterprises’ (aka, High Quality Research’s) “[s]urgical records for cats and dogs, including multiple ‘debarking’ procedures, lacked any references to the use of anesthesia, according to the report. Routine medical care records for several animals were also missing or incomplete for months at a time….”
“Many animals diagnosed with a medical condition or exhibiting symptoms received delayed care or no care at all, according to the report. For some animals there were days or weeks between a diagnosis or the first appearance of symptoms to when they received treatment. Inspectors also observed animals that were visibly sick but had not been diagnosed and were not being treated. Animals were kept in enclosures that had torn caging, leaving multiple sharp and jagged edges where they could get injured, according to the report. Food receptacles were contaminated with feces and shavings used for bedding mixed in, and inspectors reported seeing a dog trying to eat bites of food around the other items that were mixed in.” 📰 Full Story →
University must hand over names of anonymous animal committee members, court rules
David Grimm, Science, 5/2/2025
“A 3-year effort to keep anonymous the names of scientists and other individuals who oversee animal research at a major research institution has failed. On Monday, members of the University of Washington’s (UW’s) Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) agreed to end an unprecedented legal battle against their own school to block its release of their personal information to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)….”
“‘We have lost our lawsuit, and it is the end of the fight,’ [said] UW’s IACUC chair . . . Early last month, a federal court issued its final ruling in the case, arguing that the IACUC members’ fear did not outweigh the public’s right to information about individuals serving a government function. The court also noted that the names of some members of the IACUC–including [the IACUC chair]–have been public for years without additional harassment taking place, and that the committee has continued to be able to recruit new participants.” 📰 Full Story →
OHSU posts lengthy defense of primate research center amid calls for the facility to close down
Anthony Macuk, KGW8, 5/2/2025
OHSU “has come under increasing fire amid reports of accidents and accusations of animal mistreatment . . . The primate center in particular came under scrutiny after InvestigateWest reported in 2023 that of the seven monkey research facilities in the U.S., the OHSU center had the most Animal Welfare Act Violations from 2014 to 2022….”
PETA has set up “a travelling exhibit outside OHSU called ‘How the Other Half Lives.’ The group said the exhibit, presented as a 7-foot-tall pair of binoculars, will contrast the conditions in research labs with living conditions of monkeys in the wild. ‘Through these lenses, the public sees what OHSU carefully hides; monkeys trapped in barren metal cages barely bigger than their own bodies, living in fear, and discarded like used paper towels, while their wild kin thrive in rich forests, surrounded by family,’….” 📰 Full Story →
Opinion: Government shouldn’t be subsidizing puppy abuse
Justin Marceau & Jared Goodman, The Cap Times, 5/3/2025
“ . . . Ridglan’s beagle abuse is subsidized with millions of our tax dollars. Colleges, universities and private laboratories across the country use taxpayer dollars to purchase puppies from Ridglan for experimentation. Beagles from Ridglan have been used in tests funded with federal dollars by the [NIH] and other agencies, including the National Science Foundation, the Department of Interior and the [USDA].”
“During the COVID pandemic, Ridglan even received two fully forgiven loans from the Small Business Administration totaling $441,000.” 📰 Full Story →
NIH closes experimentation labs accused of brutally killing thousands of beagles for 40+ years
Alexandra Koch, Fox News, 5/4/2025
“[NIH] director Jay Bhattacharya recently announced on Fox News the agency closed its last in-house beagle laboratory on the NIH campus. The announcement comes just days after Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) head Elon Musk posted on X that he would investigate funding beagle experiments.”
“A report from the White Coat Waste (WCW) project detailed the lab’s history of allegedly pumping pneumonia-causing bacteria into more than 2,000 beagles’ lungs, bleeding them out, and forcing them into septic shock for deadly experiments.” 📰 Full Story →
Injuries, missing teeth and infection: PETA raises concerns from UMass monkey lab records
Heather Morrison, Mass Live, 5/7/2025
“‘The marmosets in Dr. [Agnès] Lacreuse’s laboratory are being forced to spend their entire lives in a cage, enduring multiple major surgical procedures, frequent fluid restriction, lengthy restraint, and ultimately, death and dissection,’ PETA [] said in a statement. ‘… when you add how consistently Lacreuse and her laboratory staff fail to provide these long-suffering animals even the minimal care required by law, resulting in illnesses and injuries, it is absolutely infuriating. It should be shut down immediately.’” 📰 Full Story →