Animals in laboratories
From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1994:
The American Medical Association has honored Louisiana State
University researchers Michael Carey and Betty Jean Oseid (his wife) for their
“defiant and unflinching stand against animal rights extremists.” Carey spent $2.1
million shooting more than 700 cats in the head until a General Accounting Office
probe found the work dubious, influencing the U.S. Army to halt funding in
1989. A stint as a combat surgeon in the Persian Gulf War revamped his image,
Mike Wallace of CBS 60 Minutes whitewashed the cat-shooting, blaming animal
rights activists rather than the GAO for
the Army decision, and Carey has
been on the stump seeking renewed
funding ever since.
A newly adopted New York
l a w bars use of live animals in class-
room exercises that cause death or
harm to the animals, reinforcing State
Education Department guidelines
issued in 1981. Strictly supervised
experiments by advanced placement
classes are exempted.
An electrical fire on July 9
razed Simonsen’s Laboratories main
rodent breeding facility near Gilroy,
Calif., killing 170,000 rats and mice––
a third of the stock. Simonsen’s is the
biggest lab animal supplier in the west.
Stanford University law
student Nathan Winograd on July 5
asked the USDA to probe an alleged
“14-year history of animal neglect and
mistreatment” in Stanford laboratories.
Said USDA investigator Ron DeHaven,
“I don’t see anything that isn’t taken
directly from our reports. That tells me
the system is working. I’d hate to see
that get turned around and they get pun-
ished for a having a system that identi-
fies problems and corrects them.”
Approximately 80 experi-
ments were done with salamanders,
jellyfish, sea urchins, flies, goldfish,
and Medaka fish aboard the space shut-
tle Columbia during a 15-day flight in
mid-July. Seven fish hatched from
eggs during the flight were the first ver-
tebrates born in weightless conditions.
The Human Fertilization
and Embryology Authority, a British
government agency, ruled July 20 that
donated eggs from corpses and aborted
fetuses could be used in research, but
not to treat infertile women.
