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UTHSC: Animal care complaint 'promptly' addressed
Media Coverage About SAEN Stop Animal Exploitation Now
ACTION ALERT:
Contact:
Dr. Robert Gibbens
Director, Western Region, USDA
[email protected]
[email protected]
Please levy the MAXIMUM FINE against the University of Tennessee, Memphis,
for their blatant disregard of the Animal Welfare Act when their negligence
denied euthanasia to at least two pigs. Their behavior should NOT be
tolerated and MUST be punished to the fullest extent of the law.
UTHSC: Animal care complaint 'promptly' addressed
From Wayne Risher, DailyMemphian.com, July 15, 2020
A critic of animal-based experiments has taken the University of
Tennessee Health Science Center (UTHSC) to task for how baby pigs were
treated in a 2019 research project.
Stop Animal Exploitation Now this week called for a U.S. Department of
Agriculture investigation, based on findings reported by the medical
university's in-house Institutional Animal Care & Use Committee.
The allegations included failure to euthanize two piglets at appropriate
times, performing unauthorized procedures and inadequate efforts to train
the research team in monitoring the animals' health.
UTHSC said in a statement Tuesday, July 14, the issues raised by the
organization were promptly addressed, the research project was terminated,
and the principal investigator no longer works for the university.
"The University of Tennessee Health Science Center takes animal welfare in
the conduct of biomedical research very seriously. Indeed, there are
substantial processes in place to assure the protection of animal welfare
and compliance with all federal and state legal requirements," the statement
said, in part.
Stop Animal Exploitation Now (SAEN) said it obtained a copy of a May 2,
2019, letter from the UTHSC oversight committee to a USDA regional officer
pinpointing alleged violations of the Animal Welfare Act. The research was
looking at the impact of varied neo-natal diets on pre-term development.
A press release from the Milford, Ohio organization SAEN said "university
lab staff apparently botched the project so severely that university
research administration suspended the experiment."
The UTHSC committee's letter said the research was done on more than a dozen
piglets that were delivered by cesarean section.
The committee said in one instance, the principal investigator declined to
euthanize a piglet on the recommendation of the UTHSC veterinarian. Another
piglet wasn't euthanized "despite having reached one of the humane endpoints
described in the protocol (i.e. poor skin color)."
The committee spelled out requirements that would have to be met before the
research project could resume, and it said corrective actions were in
progress.
SAEN executive director Michael A. Budkie wrote to Dr. Robert M. Gibbens,
animal welfare operations director for the USDA, on Monday, July 13, 2020,
calling for a full investigation of the episode.
The university's statement said the research was terminated because "the
remediation steps outlined for the researcher were never achieved. ... The
principal investigator is no longer employed by the university. We cannot go
into any further details because of privacy and confidentiality restrictions
under state and federal law."
The university also said, "Our processes are monitored by personnel devoted
to assuring success in meeting our ethical and regulatory requirements. When
questions arise about a researcher's compliance with the rules and
regulations governing animal research, those issues are promptly
investigated.
"When researchers do not comply with the rules and regulations the
university takes prompt remedial action, and those researchers are subject
to corrective actions and sanctions. Importantly, the university is
transparent with the federal government and makes all required reports about
such matters to the appropriate federal agency.
"In this case, the report UTHSC made to the federal government (USDA) shows
that the university promptly addressed the issue," the statement said.
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