PETA Funding Helps Save Thousands of Mice From Shellfish Toxicity Testing

February 2014

For years, state fisheries have used a painful and deadly test on mice to study whether shellfish caught for human consumption contain toxins. In these tests, a sample of shellfish is mixed in a blender, and this slurry is injected into the abdomen of mice, causing them to endure seizures, paralysis, and death from suffocation. Thanks to the hard work of a PETA scientist and PETA’s funding, the Interstate Shellfish Sanitation Conference, the cooperative body that manages and promotes the cleanliness of shellfish for consumption, approved the use of a method that uses tissue from one animal in place of 200 live animals to test for toxins, sparing the lives of tens of thousands of mice each year.

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 Ingrid E. Newkirk

“Almost all of us grew up eating meat, wearing leather, and going to circuses and zoos. We never considered the impact of these actions on the animals involved. For whatever reason, you are now asking the question: Why should animals have rights?” READ MORE

— Ingrid E. Newkirk, PETA President and co-author of Animalkind