PETA ‘Mice’ to Encircle Pharma Company Over Forced Swim Test
For Immediate Release:
September 14, 2021
Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382
On Thursday, a mischief of PETA supporters wearing striking latex mouse masks will scamper to the headquarters of Eli Lilly to hold the company’s feet to the fire for refusing to ban the widely discredited, abysmally cruel forced swim test, even though most of its competitors have done so. The “mice” will display a 5-foot-tall poster naming these competitors, including Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer, and challenging Eli Lilly: “They all banned the forced swim test—why can’t you?” In the test, mice and other small animals are forced to swim in order to keep from drowning, supposedly to show the effects of anti-depressant medication. However, Eli Lilly has tormented 3,400 mice and rats in the test since 1993 and none of the drugs developed this way are on the market.
When: Thursday, September 16, 12 noon
Where: Eli Lilly Headquarters, 893 S. Delaware St. (at the intersection with E. McCarty Street), Indianapolis
“Eli Lilly is clinging to the forced swim test like an obstinate child,” says PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo. “PETA is calling on the company to acknowledge the science by banning this useless test.”
PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview.
For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.
