Animals in laboratories
From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1994:
A Call for Public Forums on the
Use of Animals in Research and Education,
issued by Jane Goodall and the Green World
Center, asks university students and faculty to
“learn about and discuss animal experimenta-
tion and its actual practice in your own com-
munity,” emphasizing exchange of perspec-
tives over confrontation. “One of the greatest
barriers to social change is the confrontational
approach,” Goodall concluded. “Many areas
of discussion do not resolve neatly into black
and white. Learning from and reasoning with
those who do not share our views is one way
we grow as people.” Mailed to university
newspapers across the U.S. circa November 1,
the call was ratified in a follow-up mailing by
the American Anti-Vivisection Society.
Copies are available from GWC at POB 45,
Highgate Springs, VT 05460.
The U.S. government conducted at
least 1,000 more radiation tests on often
unknowing human subjects between 1944 and
1974 than just the 400 recorded in official data
bases, medical ethicist Ruth Faden said on
October 25. Faden heads an advisory commit-
tee now probing the experiments, appointed
last winter by U.S. president Bill Clinton. “It
probably will be in the thousands before we
finish,” she predicted.
Among the dead in the October 31
crash of an American Eagle commuter
plane near Chicago were Bernice and Lee
Stackhouse, cofounders and owners of
Southwestern Scientific Company––a supplier
of frogs, cats, insects, and other animals to
laboratories since 1969. Employing about 20
people in Tucson, Arizona, and another 90 in
Mexico, Southwestern was the alleged recipi-
ent of cats stolen and cruelly drowned by a
ring exposed in February by the World
Society for the Protection of Animals. The
Stackhouses claimed their suppliers only catch
strays, who are humanely euthanized.
Chiron Corporation researcher
Susan Barnett announced on October 28 that
her firm has become the first to give baboons
the complete range of common AIDS symp-
toms. The Chiron team has injected two
forms of the West African strain of AIDS into
10 baboons since 1988. All now show signs
of HIV infection; of six who were injected
with a strain from the Ivory Coast, two now
have lymphocytic interstitial pneumonia,
skin lesions resembling Kaposi’s sarcoma,
and severe weight loss.
Ten pregnant rats shot into space
with the shuttle Atlantis endured
Caesarian sections on one of their two uteri
shortly after landing on November 14. They
were to give birth normally from the other
uterus on November 16. Most of the babies
were gassed for dissection, as were the moth-
ers right after birthing, but some babies were
to live with foster mothers for up to 45 days.
The same procedures were followed with 20
pregnant mothers and their offspring in a con-
trol group. The object was to see how
weightlessness affects fetal development.
Dr. Michael Balls, inventor of
three replacements for the Draize eye irri-
tancy test, on November 9 received the
fourth annual Russell and Burch Award for
outstanding contributions to the advancement
of non-animal alternatives to the use of ani-
mals in research, testing, and teaching.
Presented by the Humane Society of the U.S.,
the award is named for scientists W.M.
Russell and R.L. Burch, who first defined the
“Three Rs” approach to ending vivisection:
Reduce the number of animals used, Refine
methods to cause animals less suffering, and
Replace animal use with other techniques
whenever possible. Balls, now director of
the newly formed European Centre for the
Validation of Alternative Methods, was for-
merly with the Fund for the Replacement of
Animals in Medical Experiments.
The American Anti-Vivisection
Society, New Jersey Animal Rights
Alliance, and Lehigh Valley Animal Rights
Coalition celebrated Halloween by picketing
head injury researcher Thomas Gennarelli’s
facilities at the University of Pennsylvania,
dressed as the ghosts of baboons and pigs.
Gennarelli lost federal funding for smashing
the heads of baboons in 1985, a year after the
disclosure of videotapes of the experiments,
which were purportedly taken from the labo-
ratory by the Animal Liberation Front. In
April 1991, Gennarelli received funding from
the National Institutes of Health to resume the
work, this time using swine.
PETA and the Benetton Group
have unveiled a cruelty-free logo, showing
a stylized rabbit’s head within a circle, to be
used under license by makers of cosmetics,
personal care products, and household clean-
ers who certify that their finished products are
not tested on animals. Although the great
majority of animals used in product testing
are used to test ingredients, the certification
will not apply to testing done on ingredients.
Molecular biologist John Fagan
of Mahirishi International University
shocked the scientific world on November 17
by refunding a $600,000 cancer research
grant and refusing $1.25 million more he was
to receive, because he has decided that tin-
kering with the genetic structures of animals
and plants is immoral and unethical.
