SAEN LogoKU Medical Center Accused of 'Massive Cover-up' – Deaths of Dozens of Animals Hidden from Regulators, Federal Law Violated, Charges Watchdog
Press Release - From SAEN Stop Animal Exploitation Now

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday, January 29, 2018
Contact: Michael Budkie, SAEN, 513-575-5517 (cell) [email protected]

KU Medical Center Accused of 'Massive Cover-up' – Deaths of Dozens of Animals Hidden from Regulators, Federal Law Violated, Charges Watchdog

KANSAS CITY, KS – University of Kansas, Medical Center (KU MED) – which has killed dozens of research subjects – has engaged in a massive cover-up by hiding violations of federal law and animal cruelty from federal regulators, according to an audit of the university by a national watchdog group.

SAEN, an Ohio-based nonprofit that monitors U.S. research facilities, said today it has completed an independent audit of the University of Kansas, Medical Center, and discovered dozens of incidents of animal abuse – and a consistent pattern of withholding this information from federal regulators.

The SAEN audit, which covered May of 2015 to March of 2017, found that KU MED staff reported 23 incidents of federal non-compliances to the facility's Institutional Animal Care & Use Committee. The abuses impacted rabbits, rats, mice, and a gerbil and potentially invalidates many experiments. Dozens died, and a mouse was set on fire.

However, only four of these incidents have so far been reported to federal regulators, as is required by law. This failure could potentially endanger over $20 million in annual federal funding.

SAEN's audit was performed by obtaining internal KU MED reports via a public records request and comparing them to federal reports filed with the National Institutes of Health by KU MED. According to SAEN, KU MED failed to report more than 82 percent of the violations of federal law over a period of less than two-years.

"Not only has KU MED staff bungled its way through multiple experiments, thereby wasting millions of taxpayer dollars in federal grants and unnecessarily torturing and killing animals, but the administration has systematically failed to report these violations of law to federal agencies which violates federal law," said Michael A. Budkie, A.H.T., SAEN executive director and co-founder.

"If one or two incidents had been missed, that could be interpreted as carelessness," added Budkie. "But when more than 82 percent of the non-compliances have not been reported that can only be construed as intentional."

SAEN has contacted the Dr. Francis Collins, the Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to call for termination of all federal funding for the University of Kansas, Medical Center.

The watchdog group has also provided all of the relevant documents to the NIH's Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare and is urging an investigation. SAEN previously filed an official U.S. Dept. of Agriculture complaint against the university, urging a major penalty be levied.

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