Home Page
About SAEN
Articles and Reports
Contact Us
Events and Campaigns
Fact Sheets
Financial Information
How You Can Help
Make a Donation, Please!
Media Coverage
Newsletters
Petitions
Picture Archive
Press Releases
Resources and Links
Grass Roots Org. List

Stop Animal Exploitation NOW!
S. A. E. N.
"Exposing the truth to wipe out animal experimentation"

Newsletters
The Defender
From Fall 2008 Issue

Experiencing Life in a Box - Addiction Experiments at the University of Michigan

In the U.S. over 62,000 non-human primates are victimized in experimentation annually. One of the most common varieties of experimentation involves drug addiction. These experiments often subject squirrel monkeys, rhesus monkeys, baboons, and others primates to decades of isolation, confinement, and psychological agony.

It is difficult to comprehend what the lives of these victims are like. They are housed in stainless steel enclosures measuring roughly 33 inches long by 30 inches wide by 36 inches deep. To put yourself in their place, you must imagine spending your life confined in a small enclosure large enough to take only one or two short steps in any direction and with just enough height to stand upright. You never have the opportunity to see the sun or breathe fresh air.

Your prison contains only a seat of some variety and a rubber toy. Nothing else exists to pass the time, nothing to occupy your mind. The partially open front of your enclosure allows you to see that others like yourself are in similar rooms nearby. You can talk to, see, and possibly smell them, but you cannot interact with them in any other way.

The loneliness is devastating. You have no interaction with friends or family; never even have the opportunity to touch another human. You often feel like you are losing your mind, and many of your fellow prisoners behave as though they have already lost their minds.

This is your entire life. It ends only when you become ill from some condition which is a result of the experiment that has totally consumed your life. When death finally comes, it provides your only possibility of escape.

This is the brutal reality of what a primate experiences in a lab. One such laboratory is the University of Michigan (UM). The experiments at this facility have been underway for decades � consuming the lives of hundreds of primates. Two UM researchers, James Woods and Gail Winger, are currently performing drug addiction experiments on macaque monkeys which have squandered over $13 million in federal grants in just the last five years. However, Winger has been federally funded since 1976, and Woods has been funded since 1971.

Almost every health record for the primates at UM which were used in addiction experiments lists a time when the monkeys are ripping out their hair, or worse. Several actually mention multiple incidents of severe self-mutilation. Other primates are listed as requiring the amputation of their tails due to self-inflicted lacerations.

One of the UM primates named Scallywag is listed as losing weight from the constant activity associated with psychologically abnormal behavior. Another primate named Clash had a 12% weight loss of unknown origin. Yet, another rhesus monkey is described as declining from 6.8 kg to 5.8 kg (15 pounds to 12 � pounds) a 15% weight loss in just 3 months. This animal also has constant muscle contractions and is hypothermic which could be related to drug withdrawal. Yet, another primate named Data had a weight loss of 10.5% in a short period.

Harpo�s records discuss four incidents of self-mutilation in five days during 2006; this comes after a long history of self-destructive behavior. Eminem wears a �long sleeved jacket due to history of self-mutilation.� Scallywag behaves abnormally around people. The list goes on and on and on.

In addition to the social isolation that comes from solitary confinement, these rhesus monkeys wear a nylon jacket to cover a surgically implanted intravenous catheter used to administer addictive drugs. The catheter exits through a site on the primate�s back and is connected to a metal spring arm which is affixed to the rear of the cage, further limiting the mobility of the primate. It is no surprise that these monkeys can be trained to self-administer addictive drugs because addiction is the only way that they can escape the mind-numbing boredom.

Many of these animals are transferred from other labs that also perform psychological experiments on primates including: Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU aka Medical College of Virginia), Yerkes Primate Center (connected to Emory University), and National Institutes of Health, itself. It is entirely likely that these unfortunate animals suffered through conditions within these other labs that were sufficient to cost them their sanity, and then were transferred to the University of Michigan to continue in similar experiments or worse. The lives of these primates are long, some have now endured psychological and addiction experiments since at least 1990, suffering through decades of drug addiction and psychological agony.

It is obvious that laboratory captivity has made these animals psychologically abnormal. The applicability for human medicine of a psychological experiment on a different species of primates is questionable at best when the primates are healthy. The UM primates in the labs of Winger and Woods are anything but psychologically normal, making these projects essentially meaningless.

Go on to Next Article
Return to
Fall 2008 Issue

We welcome your comments and questions


This site is hosted and maintained by:
The Mary T. and Frank L. Hoffman Family Foundation
Thank you for visiting all-creatures.org.
Since date.gif (991 bytes)