Monkey Trouble: The USDA puts OU on notice for animal abuse
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Demand a major fine against the University of Oklahonma for the continuing negligence which allowed an infant baboon to be hosed down and cages to be caked with excrement.

Monkey Trouble: The USDA puts OU on notice for animal abuse
By Louis Fowler, RedDirtReport.com, February 26, 2015

NORMAN, Okla. - Between their handling of Nazi-looted art to a star member of their football team allegedly striking a woman in a sandwich shop, this hasn’t been the famed Sooners finest few months.

That streak isn’t about to change anytime soon: according to a report from Bloomberg (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-02-20/usda-cites-university-of-oklahoma-for-abusing-animals), the University of Oklahoma is under fire from the United States Department of Agriculture for egregious acts of abuse against animals used in research labs at the OU Health Sciences Center.

According to the report from the USDA, OU was cited last month for hosing down infant monkeys and baboons, risking the animals lives to hypothermia, all the while storing them in unsanitary cages filled with excrement and other assorted filth. The report noted that the persons in care of the animals were ill-trained and had no knowledge of care-taking or sanitizing procedures in regards to the handling of the animals.

A phone call to James Tomasek, the vice-president for research mentioned in the Bloomberg article, went unanswered. However, he did go on record in an emailed statement to the press to say that the University “takes seriously its obligation to comply with all federal and regulatory standards related to animal welfare,”

The report goes on to note that this isn’t the first time that the University of Oklahoma has been taken to task in how it treats its animal research subjects: they been cited 16 times over the past two years, including, in 2013, “euthanizing dogs by electrocuting them with a 9-volt battery attached to their hearts while the animals were under anesthesia,” according to the Bloomberg story.

Stop Animal Exploitation Now, a non-profit organization working towards the total liberation of animals from laboratories, has been making the public aware of OU’s non-compliance issues and is now calling for government action.

In a statement, SAEN said: “Please levy the MAXIMUM fine against University of Oklahoma for their blatant disregard of the Animal Welfare Act when their negligence hosed down baby baboons and illegally killed dogs. Their behavior should NOT be tolerated and MUST be punished to the fullest extent of the law.”

Additionally, Natalie Schmigle of Norman, OK, has organized a Change.org petition titled “Shut Down the Inhumane Animal Testing Lab at the University of Oklahoma” (https://www.change.org/p/university-of-oklahoma-shut-down-the-inhumane-animal-testing-lab-at-the-university-of-oklahoma) that is currently only 30 signees away from reaching its goal of 1500 names.

(It’s also been called out that this report was released around the same time the University’s other January dust-up, the Jack White/Guacamole scandal that made national headlines. Without going too much into the realm of conspiracies and whatnot, it has been theorized on various forums that this buried news-story has all the markings of having been part of a failed distraction.)

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