Experimentation in the News

Here are but a few instances of animal cruelty reported in the farming industry. It should be noted that some of these stories are reported before the individuals involved have undergone legal proceedings. In essence, they are innocent until proven guilty.

I have taken care to include whole quotes as I find them. Accordingly, if you pay attention you may find a sentence that if removed would have made the statement far more demeaning to certain people and to the activity of farming in general. Because I believe in keeping things in relative context though, I have avoided this entirely. Therefore, these statements are as issued.
(1 Quotations)

• Guardian Unlimited - "Secret documents describing how some monkeys can scream in misery, fear and anger during experiments were produced in the high court yesterday as evidence that the laws intended to protect laboratory animals are being flouted.
  Excerpts from Cambridge University internal papers - one of several sites where primate research is carried out - give laboratory technicians and scientists advice on how to deal with problems during and after experiments. Presented in court by the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV), they describe occasions when primates are "screaming, trying to get out of the box, defecating", and state: "This is an angry animal."
  Scientists and technicians are advised in the documents to "punish" the bad habits of the monkeys, stating that these bad habits include the normal self-grooming.
  Richard Drabble QC, for the BUAV, told the high court yesterday that the documents contradict the general public perception that animals are well cared for and protected under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986. . . .
  David Thomas, the solicitor for BUAV, said: "Cambridge staff work 9-5pm, so animals who had just been brain damaged were left overnight without veterinary attention.
  "Some were found to be dead in the morning, some were found to be in a worse condition. Yet there is an obligation of licence holders to keep suffering to a minimum. The whole system is very secretive and the public does not get to see what is really going on."
  The court challenge comes after the government's chief inspector of animals dismissed the findings of a 10-month undercover investigation by BUAV into three research programmes at Cambridge in 1998. BUAV claimed they discovered monkeys which had the tops of their heads sawn off in order for a stroke to be induced and were then left for 15 hours without veterinary attention." [67]