ACTION ALERT:
Contact:
Dr. Robert Gibbens
Director, Animal Welfare Operations, USDA-APHIS
[email protected]
[email protected]
Please levy the MAXIMUM FINE against the University of Southern California
for their blatant disregard of the Animal Welfare Act when their negligence
inflicted excessive neck injuries on pigs. Their behavior should NOT be
tolerated and MUST be punished to the fullest extent of the law.
USC Accused of Animal Abuse in Labs; Ears Allegedly Amputated for No Reason
From MyNewsLA.com, February 17, 2021
USC is being accused of animal cruelty after unauthorized staff members
allegedly amputated the ears of multiple mice in acts that were not
connected to scientific experiments, overdosed other mice with painkillers
leading to their deaths, and inflicted excessive stab sounds in the necks of
pigs during surgeries, a watchdog group said Wednesday.
The group Stop Animal Exploitation Now said it acquired internal USC reports
via a Freedom of Information Act request, which revealed the three separate
violations. According to the reports, school officials placed the lab’s
animal use protocols on suspension in December for at least 90 days, denied
access to the animal facility for the individuals involved with the
amputations, and suspended all animal use activity at the lab where the mice
were overdosed.
SAEN officials said that’s not enough. They’re calling for the individuals
involved with the acts to be fired immediately, and have filed a complaint
with the U.S. Department of Agriculture for “a clear violation of the Animal
Welfare Act.”
USC did not immediately respond to a request for comment from City News
Service.
“Protocol suspensions and barring staff from the facility was nowhere near
sufficient. Body parts of four animals were simply cut off for no reason,
this was not part of any experiment,” Michael Budkie, SAEN’s executive
director, wrote in a letter to USC President Carol Folt on Tuesday. “… The
act of amputating the ears of the mice had no scientific or veterinary
justification. There was no legitimate reason for this action to take place.
I am very concerned that it was simply a violent act of abuse. I see no
other explanation.”
SAEN also revealed letters apparently written by USC to the National
Institutes of Health’s Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare in which the
school reported the violations and the steps they’d taken to remedy them.
The lab where the mice were given the overdoes was previously under
probation for a similar noncompliance from July 2019 where the incorrect
form and dose of buprenorphine was administered to post-operative rodents,
resulting in inadequate analgesic coverage of multiple animals, according to
one of USC’s letters to the national agency.