Written by PETA
Yesterday morning, Procter & Gamble's annual meeting received a special guest when a PETA doggie (a gal in a costume, not a canine in Norfolk) stopped by to urge P&G—the maker of Iams dog food—to stop making animals suffer in laboratories.
PETA's ongoing campaign to end animal testing at Iams has led the manufacturer to end all invasive and deadly animal tests involving dogs and cats—but Iams refuses to end its support for experiments on other species, and it still keeps as many as 700 dogs locked up in its laboratories for feeding trials and nutritional studies.
To encourage passersby to choose cruelty-free doggie chow, PETA demonstrators passed out free samples of V-dog high-protein dog food. Not only is V-dog not tested on animals, it's also vegan!
V-dog is one of many alternatives to animal-unfriendly dog food. You can check out a complete list of cruelty-free dog foods here.
Written by Amanda Schinke
Several years ago, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) decided to tackle the issue of determining the safety of nanomaterials—teeny-tiny particles that measure less than one-tenth of a micrometer (even smaller than the brain of the average Michael Vick fan) As soon as we learned about this initiative, our staff scientists began communicating with the EPA, urging the agency to use the most modern and sophisticated testing methods instead of automatically relying on archaic animal tests, as government agencies historically have, basically for no better reason than "we've always done it that way."
Last week, our scientists' hard work paid off: The EPA issued its final "Nanomaterials Research Strategy," and it incorporates many of PETA's recommendations. While the original draft still relied heavily on animal tests, the final plan takes full advantage of non-animal test methods. This will greatly reduce the number of animals killed in tests assessing the toxicity of nanomaterials.
Just as important, the research strategy reiterates the principles outlined in the strategic plan the EPA released this spring, which calls for identifying and using non-animal testing methods that will ultimately replace all animal tests for nanomaterials.
This is a win-win for PETA, animals, and the EPA. Oh, and the public wins, too, because reducing the use of animals in assessing the toxicity of nanomaterials also improves the agency's ability to assess hazards to humans.
Written by Alisa Mullins
Who needs a spa treatment when you can rejuvenate your soul by nuzzling 800-pound piggies at an animal sanctuary?
Well, a group of us kids from PETA and the PETA Foundation were lucky enough to do just that over the weekend. An hour north of D.C. lies a spectacular oasis called Poplar Spring Animal Sanctuary. It consists of 400 acres devoted entirely to the rehabilitation of abused and/or neglected animals. This past Sunday, Poplar Spring hosted its annual Open House and Fundraiser. I don't think anyone could turn down yummy vegan nosh and cuddle time with the cuties pictured below, do you?
This is Bobby and yours truly. Before coming to the sanctuary, he and his friend Harry had lived their entire lives in cages and were used in insulin experiments. When they arrived at Poplar Spring, both of them were white as snow because they had never seen a single ray of sunshine. The first thing they did when they arrived at Poplar? They dove into a mud pool and stared up in amazement at the trees and stars. What a lucky guy, and such a looker too!
I'm telling you, folks, I highly recommend finding your nearest animal sanctuary and visiting. Or better yet, volunteer! With Thanksgiving coming up, most farm sanctuaries have special Thanksgiving celebrations that honor their turkeys. If my picture doesn't convince you, maybe these will.
Written by Missy Lane
British artist Damien Hirst—known for his series of "art" installations featuring dead (and yes, sometimes dissected) animals preserved in formaldehyde—has reportedly hung up his canning supplies in favor of a paintbrush.
Apparently Hirst has spent the last three years painting in a shed behind his house. He says he had to relearn to paint for the first time since he was an art student, and the paintings were, at first, "embarrassing," and he "didn't want anyone to come in."
It looks like reconnecting with art in its pure form, instead of focusing on shock art that exploits animals and treats their bodies as amusements, has made Damien rethink the direction his career has taken. You've got to wonder why the man wasn't as embarrassed by his past work …
Here's hoping that Damien will stick to this new oeuvre.
Many of you have been writing to and calling the University of California–Irvine to demand that it stop using animals in horrible classroom experiments, and your efforts have paid off. The university has just announced that it's ending deadly procedures using rats and replacing them with sophisticated computer simulations.
In the cruel neuroscience experiments conducted at the university, undergrads were drilling holes into rats' skulls, damaging their brains with chemicals, and forcing them to perform in behavioral experiments to assess the brain damage they inflicted. Then the rats were killed. Following a complaint filed by PETA that included suggestions for non-animal alternatives, as well as thousands of e-mails, letters, and phone calls from our supporters, UC–Irvine conducted a review of the experiment and decided that modern, effective non-animal methods will now be used instead of animals.
Because of this victory, as many as 200 rats will be saved from suffering each year.
This is great news, but animals are still suffering in other labs, so it's no time to rest on our laurels.
Case in point: At Arizona State University (ASU), baby rats are killed in classroom experiments in which students remove the animals' small intestines and uteruses. In other experiments, frogs' brains are destroyed when pins are stuck through their skulls, and rabbits have holes cut into their chests and are injected with various drugs before being killed.
Please take a moment to contact ASU and urge the school to follow the example of UC–Irvine by putting an end to the use of animals in classroom laboratories once and for all.
Written by Jeff Mackey
Back in March, we told you about the USDA's investigation at Oregon National Primate Research Center (ONPRC). The investigation came about as a result of a PETA complaint exposing that a monkey had been operated on by mistake; that a sick, pregnant monkey had been denied veterinary care; and that other abuses had taken place. The USDA backed up our findings, citing ONPRC for violations of the Animal Welfare Act and issuing the facility a warning. And let's not forget what we found during our undercover investigation.
Well, it's been barely seven months, and ONPRC is in hot water again. According to a lawsuit filed by InVivo Therapeutics—one of the companies that hired ONPRC to torture experiment on monkeys—ONPRC so severely neglected seven monkeys whose spinal cords it had surgically severed that four of the monkeys had to be euthanized.
Of course, the lawsuit is a lose-lose for the monkeys. InVivo had paid ONPRC to paralyze the animals so that researchers could implant them with a device developed by InVivo in order to see if they would regain any movement. In the lawsuit, InVivo alleges that early in the research period, more than one third of the monkeys provided by ONPRC suffered illnesses or injuries such as bladder problems because ONPRC failed to provide the proper post-surgery care or a medical device necessary to keep their bodily systems functioning. InVivo also alleges that at least one monkey developed "a debilitating staph infection" as a result of bacteria at ONPRC.
The publicity surrounding the case has shined another spotlight on abuses at ONPRC as well as the inadequacy of the federal law that is supposed to protect animals in laboratories.
If you have a strong stomach, go to StopAnimalTests.com to find out more about the cruel, redundant, and archaic experiments conducted on primates at ONPRC, and then dash off a letter to the National Institutes of Health, urging it to stop funneling your tax dollars to ONPRC.
It's a hazy day here on the Right Coast. As I watch leaves fall and steam rise from my soy mocha, the mood is set for a lazy (yet highly skilled) meander through gossip rags for fun stuff. Here are my faves:
Thanks for stopping by! Catch you next time, and don't forget to hug all your vegetarian friends.
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
According to news reports out of Nepal, that country's forest minister, Dipak Bohara, has "imposed a ban on monkey breeding for export to the United States for biomedical research."
This could be an important first step toward ending the grotesque breeding-and-export trade in monkeys once and for all.
The next step is for the Nepali government to listen to the coalition of animal protection groups (including PETA India) that has been urging the government to rehabilitate the hundreds of monkeys at a breeding center in Lele and to pass a law that would halt all commercial wildlife breeding.
We hope Nepal's action also inspires officials in Puerto Rico to block plans by Bioculture to build a monkey-breeding facility there. But in case they're not paying attention to Nepali news—and, let's face it, many folks aren't—please be sure to add your voice to the growing chorus opposing the construction of Bioculture's facility.
Who's serving detention for animal abuse? Read on to see how you can fight back against bullies and speak up for the little guys on Twitter!
Bully #1: TexasTechThese bullies have been caught red-handed! Participants in a training course at Texas Tech shove hard plastic tubes down cats' windpipes and repeatedly stab them in the chest with needles before killing them!How to help: Post the following to your Twitter account: Hey, @TexasTech! Scratch your cruel training procedures on cats, and adopt non-animal alternatives! http://ow.ly/oEtw
Bully #2: Ross UniversityClass isn't the only thing they've been cutting at Ross University. Students have been forced to cut the nerves in donkeys' toes, sever their ligaments, surgically puncture their abdomens, and slice their tracheas.How to help: Post a message on Twitter by clicking here.
Bully #3: Marquette UniversityCollege is a time for experimentation—but not on animals. A Marquette University faculty member bashes turtles over the head with a hammer and saws into their shells for a classroom experiment!How to help: Tweet this: You've been nailed, @MarquetteU! Stop bashing turtles in the head with hammers, NOW!
Bully #4: Bucknell UniversityPupils should be using their brains at school, not a hamster's. Bucknell University faculty members drill holes into the skulls of hamsters in sexual-reproduction experiments!How to help: Spread the word on Twitter by posting the following: Did u know that @BucknellU faculty members drill holes into the skulls of live hamsters? Tell 'em 2 stop, & pass along! http://ow.ly/oEld
So how 'bout it, Twitterers? You gonna teach these schools a lesson? Complete all four assignments to earn an A+!
Written by Royale Ziegler
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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