NIH’s Francis Collins Announces Retirement 8 Days After Cover-up Exposé: PETA Statement

For Immediate Release:
March 2, 2025

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

Please see the following statement from PETA senior vice president Kathy Guillermo following Francis Collins’ announcement that he is leaving NIH entirely. His announcement comes just eight days after The Daily Caller released emails obtained by PETA in a lawsuit revealing that Collins, then director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), continued to fund experiments on infant monkeys even after his own expert said they were pointless and then concealed top level discussions by using private email:

Francis Collins should have resigned his position as Director of NIH more than a decade ago, when he first used private email to conceal the truth about the total uselessness of cruel baby monkey experiments that PETA exposed. Now, just eight days after his deceit is revealed, he is out, and PETA says good riddance. We need a Director of NIH who will look at science and ethics and implement superior animal free research methods rather than continue the hideous abuse of animals for political reasons. 

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.