Vanderbilt University fined $8,156 for lab animals dying unnecessarily, what you can do

From Examiner
By Cheryl Hanna

It has been the third consecutive year Vanderbilt University has been cited for protocol violations concerning the humane treatment of laboratory animals. In 2006, the school was cited for administering expired medication and for the lack of “environmental enrichment” which included exercise wheels for hamsters in order to combat animal boredom. In 2007, the university was fined $7,219 for more protocol violations.

The 2008 violations incurred when a baby monkey was thrown into a washing machine according to a report by the Tennessean. Galago monkeys are nocturnal primates and are often called “bush babies” because of their cries. When full grown the monkeys rarely weigh more than five to ten ounces. The mother monkey had been removed before the cage was cleaned, but the baby was missed and tossed into the wash with the cage bedding.

Further violations in 2008 concerned five hamsters that were injected with an improperly mixed experimental compound.

The United States Department of Agriculture determined the animals died unnecessarily in 2008 because protocols were not followed. Vanderbilt officials stated they noted the mistakes and corrected the protocols immediately. They cite animals in medical research for cancer, AIDS, and diabetes are treated humanely, and support the need for animals in research as life saving medications and surgical procedures need to be tested on animals first.

John Howser, director of the Medical Center’s Office of News & Communications states, ” Vanderbilt University is firmly committed to the highest standards of care and the most humane protocols for all animals necessary to conduct medical research.”

Animal welfare groups have criticized both Vanderbilt University and the USDA for allowing the continual lapse of protocol which has not been ensuring humane treatment for laboratory animals to continue.

RELATED, WHAT YOU CAN DO:

From PCRM

Please contact Vanderbilt University School of Medicine dean Jeffrey R. Balser, M.D., Ph.D., and ask him to replace the use of pigs in all Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) courses with validated nonanimal training methods. Please click HERE to send an automatic message.

From PETA

When a whistleblower at Vanderbilt University contacted PETA with an internal e-mail that indicated that brain surgeries were conducted on monkeys without general anesthesia, PETA sprang into action. Vanderbilt has run afoul of federal animal welfare laws in recent years; in fact, official government documents obtained by PETA reveal that, in 2005, the university was cited for violations of 13 different Animal Welfare Act (AWA) regulations. Our investigation of those violations exposed Jeffrey D. Schall as one of Vanderbilt’s most notorious repeat offenders with regard to animal abuse, so his name was quite familiar to us when it appeared on the informant’s accompanying note implicating him in yet another appalling violation.

Schall’s federally funded experiments use approximately $1.5 million taxpayer dollars per year and involve cutting off the tops of monkeys’ skulls in order to insert wires and posts and attach metal coils to their eyes. Schall was suspended from animal research for one month in 2004 after he performed unauthorized surgery on a monkey, deprived animals of fluids, and failed to sanitize a feces-covered primate-restraint chair. That same year, Schall threatened an animal care technician for reporting to the university veterinarian that an animal’s collar had become entangled with the bottom bars of the cage.

Please send polite letters to Vanderbilt Chancellor Gordon Gee. Demand that Schall be suspended immediately and ask that a thorough review of Schall’s experiments be conducted with regard to his repeated misconduct toward animals. Please also send polite e-mails to Jeffrey Schall and ask that he stay away from monkeys and cease his experiments immediately:

Chancellor Gordon Gee
211 Kirkland Hall
Nashville, TN 37240
615-322-1813
615-322-6060 (fax)
chancellor@vanderbilt.edu

Jeffrey Schall
004 Wilson Hall
111 21st Ave. S.
Nashville, TN 37203-0009
615-322-0868
615-343-5027 (fax)
jeffrey.d.schall@vanderbilt.edu

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