PETA Statement: Monell Center Partners With Ajinomoto in Cruel and Deadly Animal Test

For Immediate Release:
May 10, 2021

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

Please see PETA Vice President Shalin Gala’s statement regarding a recent animal experiment coauthored by Ajinomoto:

The world’s leading MSG maker, Ajinomoto, has been tormenting thousands of dogs and other animals in laboratories since the 1950s. In a recently published experiment in collaboration with the Monell Center, sensitive mice were subjected to cruel and deadly tests simply to determine whether they prefer sugar water or regular water. Specifically, experimenters dripped sugar water on the animals’ tongues and measured electrical responses from their nerves, which the experimenters cut open and exposed. They also repeatedly injected the mice with glucose and insulin, took their blood, and killed and dissected them. There is no excuse for Ajinomoto to continue these misguided animal tests, which are curiosity-driven, not required by law, and irrelevant to the company’s business. Ajinomoto should join the ranks of the dozens of global food companies that have banned animal tests after discussions with PETA, including Takasago International Corporation and McCormick & Company, Inc., which are corporate sponsors of the Monell Center but have prohibited their funding from being used for animal tests.

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.