Written by PETA
The agency that oversees the largest animal testing program of all time has just announced new guidelines that mean that the number of animals who could fall victim to toxicity testing during the course of the program has dropped—by 4.5 million!
This news from the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) comes in response to a detailed letter PETA initiated in cooperation with other animal protection groups. That letter was written after we learned from a chemical manufacturer that under the E.U.'s new Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemical Substances (REACH) Regulation, a number of duplicative tests were going to be conducted.
PETA, along with PETA Europe, the European Coalition to End Animal Experiments, Eurogroup for Animals, HSI Europe, and the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, voiced concerns about the likelihood that companies would conduct duplicative animal tests for some types of toxicity when registering their chemicals under REACH. The letter explained how the redundant testing could be avoided.
ECHA was quick to issue a news release and a factsheet instructing chemical companies not to conduct initial toxicity screenings if they are planning to conduct more comprehensive tests during the later stages of REACH. Based on ECHA's own figures, 6,000 chemicals may fall under the relevant information requirements, and because up to 735 animals may be used for the initial toxicity screening for each chemical tested, ECHA's response has the potential to save the lives of 4.5 million animals.
There's still much work to be done, as REACH will still cause massive animal suffering. But you can bet your (vegan) boots that our next step will be to do everything possible to make sure that companies follow ECHA's new guidelines so that as many animals as possible will be spared.
Written by Shawna Flavell
Imagine being sealed inside a clear coffin, bubble-wrapped, packaged in a box and sent through the mail on a terrifying journey to an unknown destination. Jostled around, forced to endure the summer heat while sitting in a delivery truck, and living in your own waste. If you can imagine this, you have some idea of how the little frog in this video feels.
This traumatized or now dead frog is a 'replacement' for another who died in a Brookstone Frog-O-Sphere. Despite public outrage and PETA protests, the body count continues to rise as Brookstone refuses to stop peddling live animals.
Urge Brookstone to send these Frog-O-Spheres packing and immediately implement a policy against selling live animals at all of their stores. If you know anybody who has misguidedly purchased these poor frogs only to watch them helplessly suffer and die, please inform them to request a chargeback on their credit card as Brookstone defers responsibility and costs for deaths and 'replacements' to the breeder.
Written by Amy Elizabeth
Remember when Al Roker suggested to Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt that there are some people who believe that they just might be "everything that is wrong with celebrity in this country"?
It looks like the dreaded "Speidi" are proving Mr. Roker's point for him. Much like other famous airheads, "Speidi" have shown their total disregard for the plight of homeless animals by buying themselves a "designer dog."
When the duo first expressed an interest in adding a canine member to their family, PETA sent them a letter clueing them in to the importance of adopting dogs and cats from shelters—but, apparently, Heidi and Spencer are too caught up in themselves to care about the 6 to 8 million dogs and cats who are turned over to animal shelters every year.
We probably shouldn't be surprised, though. Here's a question for you: What happened to Bella the Chihuahua?
Written by Amanda Schinke
This morning, when Prime Minister Stephen Harper met with President Obama at the Canadian Embassy in D.C., he got a welcome that I'm sure he won't forget any time soon.
Written by Liz Graffeo
By now, you probably know what President Obama thinks about Kanye's VMA stunt.
We want the president to rest assured that PETA, for one, can sympathize with his sentiments. After all, this isn't the first time that Kanye has been insensitive to the feelings of others.
Written by Karin Bennett
Don't worry, he's still John James Preston, but Big? Not so much.
A vegetarian cleanse helped Chris Noth slim down so that he could reprise his role as the charming commitmentphobe in Sex and the City 2. When asked how he got that body into shape, he said, "It was a total vegetarian diet … I've never been a vegetarian, but the way [the Island Experience in Brazil] prepare[s] it is exquisite."
Even though he left Carrie at the altar in Part 1, if he makes this new vegetarian lifestyle permanent, it might make me forgive him in time for Part 2. There's really no better way to stay trim, healthy, and compassionate … you can bet your cosmo on that.
Written by Christine Doré
Just a month after PETA wrote to the cast and producers of The Zookeeper to warn them that the company supplying animals for the movie's production has a long list of USDA citations, we have heartbreaking news to report. Tweet, a giraffe on the set who had also been forced to perform in Ace Ventura and a slew of Toys "R" Us commercials, has died.
Tweet collapsed in his pen while being fed on Friday. While giraffes in the wild can live into their mid 20s, Tweet was only 18 years old.
The results of Tweet's necropsy haven't been released yet, but according to a whistleblower who contacted PETA, Tweet's premature death may have resulted from his eating pieces of the blue tarp that covered his enclosure. The whistleblower alleges that Tweet's owner and trainers were notified that the giraffe had been eating the tarp but that they did nothing about it.
The whistleblower also said that Tweet spent the last few months of his life confined to a 20-foot-by-20-foot stall, which was barely large enough for the 18-foot-tall giraffe to lie down in. In their natural habitat, giraffes live in vast home ranges of up to 400 square miles.
PETA is now calling on the USDA to investigate Tweet's death. We're also asking for other people associated with the production of the movie to come forward with additional information about the treatment of animals on the set.
Since we posted our action alert about Brookstone's boneheaded decision to sell live frogs and snails who are confined to minuscule "Frog-O-Spheres," we've heard from lots of people who've confirmed our worst fears about the likely fate of these animals.
Brookstone has admitted that they aren't screening potential "Frog-O-Sphere" customers, and their woefully inadequate recommendations for care—changing the water twice a year and feeding the frogs twice a week—are leading to snap decisions by unprepared people, as is likely the case with the person who posted this comment on Brookstone's Web site:
"[T]he snail died in about a week (but really, who cares?). And the recommended 2 pellets a week is not enough (the frogs are so hungry they don't move to conserve energy). When I started tripling their recommended meals, they became very active and cool. … Hopefully, they'll last until I can buy a pet snake and feed them to it."
People who are a bit more kindhearted have been flooding PETA with calls and e-mails about frogs and snails getting sick or dying, while callers to Brookstone's customer service department who complain that their frogs appear to need medical attention are merely told to put the frogs in a separate bowl. Those who call about dead frogs and snails have been told that they should throw the corpses in the garbage and that new animals can be shipped or picked up at their nearest location. As a testament to Brookstone's level of care, "replacement" animals are sent through the mail and handed to customers at the stores in plastic sandwich bags.
Other well-meaning folks are asking whether they should release the frogs into the wild, but putting non-native species into area waterways and habitats can wreak havoc on local ecosystems.
The continued sale of Frog-O-Spheres poses a clear threat to these vulnerable animals. Please add your voice to those of people who are demanding that Brookstone stop selling live animals once and for all.
Written by Jeff Mackey
Last week, Elizabeth Carlisle appeared in court to face cruelty-to-animals charges for allegedly drowning two rabbits while she was working at a Petland store in Akron, Ohio. On the day of Carlisle's arraignment, local PETA members and other outraged members of the community stood outside the courthouse calling on Akron's chief city prosecutor, Douglas J. Powley, to prosecute Carlisle to the fullest extent of the law.
This incident is just one example of the abuses animals suffer in pet stores nationwide. For nearly 30 years, PETA has fielded complaints regarding sick or unwanted animals who were cruelly disposed of by pet store employees, all because the cost of caring for or treating the animal exceeded the animal's "price tag." This trial offers an opportunity to send a strong and desperately needed message to the pet-store industry: Pet stores have no business selling animals.
We already loved Kathy Freston for her wonderful books, Quantum Wellness and The Quantum Wellness Cleanse, which promote a vegan diet as part of a healthy lifestyle. (Even Oprah tried the cleanse!) Now we have yet another reason to love Kathy: Her animal-friendly fashions have earned her a spot in Vanity Fair's 2009 International Best-Dressed List.
And that's not all. Kathy also defines her personal style as "cruelty-free" and her cause as "animal protection." Favorite shoes? Why, Stella McCartney, of course!
"Best-dressed" Kathy Freston is yet more proof that nobody has to die for fashion. Just wait—I'm sure we'll see a whole slew of cruelty-free fashion mavens on 2010's list.
If you have a general question for PETA and would like a response, please e-mail Info@peta.org. If you need to report cruelty to an animal, please click here. If you are reporting an animal in imminent danger and know where to find the animal and if the abuse is taking place right now, please call your local police department. If the police are unresponsive, please call PETA immediately at 757-622-7382 and press 2.
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