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Dr. Elizabeth GoldentyerGroup files animal-welfare complaint against Nationwide
Children’s over pig
From JoAnne Viviano,
Dispatch.com, May 28, 2019
An animal welfare group has asked the U.S.
Department of Agriculture to investigate and fine the Research Institute at
Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus over a pig that had to be
euthanized in March after a surgery broke protocol in a federally funded
project.
The pig, which developed sepsis, likely suffered pain and distress, and the
incident may violate several sections of the federal Animal Welfare Act,
said Michael Budkie, executive director of Stop Animal Exploitation NOW!, or
SAEN, based in southwest Ohio.
His group is asking for fines of $10,000 per infraction.
“People should be concerned about this even if they don’t care about the
animals because taxpayers are footing the bill for this project,” Budkie
said. ”... This animal death was totally unnecessary, and that has to create
questions about the science at this institution.”
In an April 1 letter notifying the federal Office of Laboratory Animal
Welfare of the breach, Nationwide Children’s says the researcher involved
was removed from working with animals pending review by the hospital’s
Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee, which established the protocols
that were broken.
Nationwide Children’s says the research in question received funding from
the National Institutes of Health, or NIH, but does not indicate the amount
of the funding.
Dr. Dennis Durbin, chief scientific officer at Nationwide Children’s, writes
in the letter to NIH that the research involves the engineering of
intestinal tissue as a possible treatment for necrotizing enterocolitis. The
condition, in which the lining of the intestinal wall dies, primarily
affects premature babies and kills up to 40 percent of infants who suffer
from it, according to NIH.
Nationwide Children’s spokeswoman Gina Bericchia called the protocol breach
an isolated incident and said the Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare
accepted the hospital’s self-reported plan and closed the case.
“Animal research is necessary for medical progress, including our work to
define new treatments for childhood diseases like muscular dystrophy,
congenital heart disease and pediatric cancer,” she said. “Historically,
animal research has led to the elimination of polio, smallpox, rabies, and
measles as public health threats.”
The “significant deviation” from protocol happened on Feb. 28 when a
researcher improperly inserted a device in a pig’s intestines instead of its
abdominal wall and then created a bypass to avoid narrowing of the
intestine, Durbin says in the NIH letter. There was a leak at the surgical
site, and the pig developed sepsis and was euthanized on March 3, according
to an NIH document provided by SAEN.
Durbin’s letter says the researcher was required to complete online courses
on laboratory animal science and will be supervised while working with
animals for three months. Any serious violations by the researcher over the
next year are to be reported directly to Durbin.
Nationwide Children’s would not identify the researcher involved.
Budkie said the temporary sidelining of a researcher is rare and makes it
clear that Nationwide Children’s took the situation seriously. Still, he
said, translating animal research to humans is often problematic, and
failing to follow protocol further places the scientific validity of the
project into question.
Animal studies are highly controlled, and such incidents are unfortunate but
rare, said Jim Newman, a spokesman for the Washington-based Americans for
Medical Progress, which supports the humane use of animals in medicine.
He said Nationwide Children’s demonstrated “a serious commitment to its
research animals” by quickly identifying and reporting the problem.
“Animals are only involved in research when necessary,” Newman said in an
email. “Therefore, we also think it is important to consider why these pigs
are being studied in the first place. It’s a line of research that could
literally save lives.”