Push to Drop Fur and Exotic Skins Heads to LVMH’s Boardroom

PETA Points to Coronavirus Risk, Cruelty to Animals Inherent in Filthy Fur and Reptile Farms

For Immediate Release:
June 29, 2020

Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-7382

“Will LVMH continue to risk public health and support extreme cruelty to animals, or will it act like an ethical and sustainable company by banning exotic skins and fur today?” That’s the question from PETA—which bought stock in LVMH in 2017—that the company will have to address during its annual meeting on Tuesday.

PETA notes that conservation experts have warned that the practices of the exotic-skins industry increase the risk of future epidemics, as the wild animals it uses are typically confined and slaughtered in filthy conditions—just as animals in “wet markets” are—creating a breeding ground for pathogens similar to the novel coronavirus. COVID-19 has already swept through fur farms, sickening minks and workers in the Netherlands, which subsequently voted to close all fur farms by the end of the year.

“As long as wild animals are crammed together in filthy, squalid pits, the next pandemic will be just around the corner,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “PETA is calling on LVMH to act to stop the risk that the production of its crocodile-skin bags and fur coats poses to public health and the extreme suffering it causes animals and join the majority of the fashion world in moving beyond fur and exotic skins.”

PETA and its affiliates have documented that in the exotic-skins industry, crocodiles are cut into while they’re still alive and thrashing in agony; snakes are pumped full of water to loosen their skin, which is peeled off, often while they’re still conscious; and feathers are yanked out of ostriches with pliers while the birds are still alive. Recent exposés of fur farms found that minks with open wounds were forced to live alongside injured and decomposing, dead cagemates; rabbits were bludgeoned with metal pipes; and a chinchilla shrieked and convulsed for over a minute after a worker failed to electrocute her properly.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.