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The New Physician, Dec 99, vol 48, no. 9, pp. 3-4. This is the monthly journal of the American Medical Student Association. See Dr. Harrison's letter to the editor regarding dog labs.
"Teach Compassion", UCSD Guardian
"UCSD scrutinized", La Jolla Village News
Dr. Savoiva, Dean of Students, reads letter from Dr. Hansen to first year medical students
Nancy Harrison's Letter to the Editor
Nancy Harrison's article in San Diego Physician, September 1999
Message from the Director, Animal Subjects Program, UCSD 3-22-2000
Letter from the Information Practice Act Coordinator at UCSD 4-17-2000
Correspondence with the UCSD Vice Chancellor of Research 5-23-2000 and 7-5-2000
Message from the Director, Animal Subjects Program, UCSD 3-2-2001
New Physician, Dec 99, vol 48, no. 9, pp. 3-4.
I am a general pathologist in private practice in San Diego and would like to expand on the issues raised in Nancy Hood's article "Animal Labs" ("Spotlight," October 1999). While most U.S. medical schools no longer vivisect animals in freshman physiology and pharmacology labs, some, like the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), still do.
Dog labs are not essential to learn physiology and pharmacology. That much is apparent from the fact that most schools, including Harvard, Yale and Stanford, don't offer them. Obviously these labs are not research, nor do they prepare students for surgery.
Good alternatives to dog labs exist. Some schools have students observe open-heart surgery (on a human) , while others use computer simulators to model the heart, lungs, vasculature and kidneys.
Although not widely known, participation in dog labs at UCSD is optional. Students can meet with the course director and express their conscientious objection. However, no alternatives to the labs is provided, and professors say material from the labs is covered on the exams.
I first became aware of student opposition to dog labs at UCSD through my significant other, an associate professor who teaches second-year pathology at the medical school. I was invited to speak at a lunch-time discussion about dog labs geared toward first-year students. The organizers of the event were two fourth-year students who had opted out of dog labs and still scored well on the Boards, received laudatory dean's letters and otherwise suffered no repercussions.
Previous classes at UCSD received little or no information concerning the necessity of the labs, the source of the dogs and professional opposition. Accordingly, almost all students at UCSD have participated in the two labs. But last spring, once the first-year students learned more about the details, nearly a third of the class opted out of the dog labs. Particularly important to the students was that the UCSD dogs are pure-bred Dobermans from a commercial breeding facility, (They are not "pound dogs.")
The professor and I, inspired by the class' dramatic
response, ciculated a petition among local San Diego physicians- addressed to UCSD's
physiology and pharmacology faculty- expressing their opposition to dog labs in the first
year of medical school. To date, 149 local physicians have signed this earnest message.
The signatories include 33 UCSD faculty, four former medical school department chairs, one
member of the National Academy of Sciences, one residency program director, and
staff from nine different hospitals representing 26 medical and surgical specialties.
NANCY L. HARRISON. M.D.
CHAIR, DEPARTMENT OF PATHOLOGY
SCRIPPS MEMOR1AL HOSPITAL CHULA VISTA
CHULA VISTA, CALIFORNIA
Teach Medicine Using Compassion, Not Animals
Commentary: Despite new, cheaper technologies, UCSD's School of Medicine still uses [vivisection to teach basic physiology]
By Neal Barnard, M.D., and Christine Dehlendorf
Special to the UCSD Guardian, October 15, 1998
Back in the bad old days, doctors commonly used, bloodletting leeches, frontal lobotomies, skull-drilling and other gruesome techniques in the name of "good medicine." Fortunately, such barbaric practices have mostly gone the way of the Spanish Inquisition. Yet, some of today's medical students still routinely and uselessly kill rabbits, cats, ferrets, pigs and -- as at UCSD -- dogs.
Despite the ready availability of far more useful and much less costly ways to teach basic physiology, pharmacology and surgery, some 61 of the 123 U.S. medical schools still strap down live animals, often friendly dogs, and perform senseless surgeries or inject various drugs to make the animals' hearts race or their muscles contract. Then they kill them.
Banned in the United Kingdom and now shunned by 62 U.S. medical schools, live-animal teaching labs provide just crude demonstrations of concepts. These "show and tell" exercises not only cost animals their lives, but also medical schools lots of money.
Animal labs don't come cheap. Maintaining a live-animal laboratory -- including buying, shipping, housing, feeding and preparing the animals -- can cost tens of thousands of dollars per year more than modern alternatives.
Of course, medical students learn best by studying the only animal they will ever treat: humans. That's why some of the finest U.S. medical schools, including those at Columbia, Tufts and Yale universities, avoid wasteful, archaic animal laboratories.
Live-animal teaching labs provide just crude demonstrations of concepts. These "show and tell" exercises not only cost animals their lives, but also medical schools lots of money.
High-tech interactive computer simulations of human physiology allow lessons to be repeated until learned, while innovative clinical classes let medical students witness human physiology and pharmacology in action.
At Harvard Medical School, students can observe an actual human
heart-bypass operation. After donning scrubs, the students see the entire surgery first
hand, including pre-surgical line placement, venous catheterization, chest opening and
vein harvesting. They can also keep an eye on hemodynamic
monitoring and the effects of cardiovascular drugs. The operations would happen anyway, so
there's essentially no added cost for the school.
Some medical schools, however, continue resisting the trend toward up-to-date, non-animal teaching methods.
There is a myth that students need animal labs to see and feel real, live physiology and pharmacology in action and that learning from a textbook or on a computer screen is not sufficient.
The truth is that students learn more about human physiology and pharmacology from studying human patients undergoing necessary surgeries and reacting to drugs administered out of real need, than from a terminal experiment on a dog or other animal. Textbooks and lectures provide additional learning, while sophisticated computer programs, repeatedly simulate biological systems, responses to various stimuli and a wide variety of case studies.
It is also a myth that an animal lab provides medical students with valuable initial clinical experience and their "first patient."
Animal labs don't teach medical procedures that students will use with human patients. They simply demonstrate know effects of pharmacological or physiological agents on certain animals. Students best prepare for their first true patient by carefully watching procedures on human patients and then taking supervised, limited roes in those procedures. A medical student's first clinical experience out to be life-affirming, not life-taking.
Some also believe that these labs don't hurt animals. Although initially anesthetized, dogs and other animals often "wake up" during the experiment or suffer unexpected trauma from faulty procedures. The stress from shipping and confinement add to the distress the animals endure.
It is often justified that the dogs used in labs will just be killed anyway at the local pound.
Many dogs, however, could be adopted into good, loving homes. The less fortunate would be quickly euthanized, not confined, shipped, experimented on and ultimately killed.
Additionally, dog labs undermine animal control efforts. Many people abandon unwanted dogs to the elements rather than bringing them to shelters where the dogs might be sent off to medical school labs. It is also a myth that students enjoy dog labs.
Of course, after many hours of tedious classroom lectures, students welcome the excitement of putting on scrubs and going into a lab. But, observing real human heart bypasss surgery is far more appealing than witnessing a German shepherd or beagle needlessly killed.
Medical schools that continue to subject animals and students to live-animal labs remain stuck in a rut. On the verge of the 21st century, excellent schools (including Stanford) produce top-notch doctors and other health professionals who have not treated animals as throwaway objects. Medical students and faculty should speak up and work for change, remembering the most famous of Hippocrates' admonitions: "First, do no harm." The voice of the campus community must be heard as well.
As renowned physician Henry Heimlich puts it, students who learn by observing in the operating room instead of partaking in a live-animal lab "will learn to be much more humane. They'll understand, having seen what goes on in the O.R., what it takes in medicine to truly help people and to attain an outcome that will save a life or improve the quality of life. And, after all, isn't that the goal of all doctors?"
Neal D. Barnard, M.D. is founder of the Washington, D.C.-based Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.
Christine E. Dehlendorf is a second-year medical student at the University of Washington-Seattle.
UCSD School of Medicine scrutinized for animal labs
By Stefani Mingo
La Jolla Village News November 12, 1998
The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) recently placed an ad in UCSD's medical school publication, The Guardian, that reads: "Med school can be a real killer. It doesn't have to be." They hope to encourage students to opt out of physiology and pharmacology animal laboratories, in which animals are anesthetized, experimented upon and sometimes dissected post mortem.
According to Michael Murphy, media coordinator for the Washington, D.C.- based PCRM, the group did a lot of outreach before putting together this campaign. "Schools that still have dog labs and where the students have gotten in touch with us, such as UCSD, are the schools that we decided to target," Murphy said. "We see this (UCSD) as a good opportunity, because we know that way we sort of have the help of people right there in San Diego, as well as at the school."
Murphy believes that school administrators might be more likely to listen if a student brings up the issue. "They will probably be stubborn in terms of dropping the labs completely, but it may just get them to sit down and work to change the current situation," he said.
"Most students go through the labs, and those that do generally give them very high evaluations and think that they are a very valuable part of the course," said the Chief of the Division of Physiology at UCSD. He has been with UCSD since 1969, and estimates that per year, three to five students from a class of 120 would rather not participate in the dog labs.
'I asked if a dog needed to die for me to see that' -- Student Liz Collumb UCSD med student
Liz Collumb remembers when the time approached in 1996 for her to take the pharmacology and physiology labs. The chairman of the physiology department brought a dog lung to the first day of class, she said. "He inflated it and deflated it (the lung), presenting it as such an opportunity for us," Collumb recalled. "I asked if a dog needed to die for me to see that, and he replied, 'Not for just that -- the dog was part of many other experiments before it was killed.'" According to Collumb, she was not given any official alternative. "We were encouraged to take lab," she said. "And if we opted out, we were responsible for all of the material on our own."
The Chief of the Division of Physiology explained that students are given a syllabus at the beginning of the physiology course that reads: "Occasionally students have difficulty learning in this setting. If a student is unable to attend the laboratories, he or she should discuss this with one of the faculty members"
"It gives names and numbers, and if contacted, the faculty member will discuss with the student alternative ways of satisfying the requirements of the course … so it's all well," he said.
In 1986, the American Medical Student Association (AMSA) established a principle urging that alternative educational materials -- such as films, videotapes and computer simulations -- be provided for students who do not choose to attend these classes and labs. Another principle condemns the practice of faculty intimidation of medical students to force them to attend classes and labs using live animals.
Collumb admitted that she felt very intimidated by her decision to skip the labs. "I don't know how much of that is just being a medical student, though," she said. "We (med students) tend to be kind of conformists." She was not penalized, in terms of her performance in class, by opting out of the dog labs. In fact, she did fine in both classes, while a colleague -- who also did not participate -- ended up with the highest score on the cardiac physiology exam.
Students are tested on the whole of the physiology course, therefore it is too difficult to determine if grades are affected by either participation in or boycotting of the dog labs, the Chief of the Division of Physiology said.
"There were just the three of us who did not participate in the first lab, but for the pharmacology term, there were about two dozen," Collumb said. "Maybe because they had such a negative experience with the first lab, and maybe because the three of us kind of sent an example."
"In my opinion, a lot more people would opt out if there were an official, sanctioned alternative," Collumb added. Two years before she opted out of the dog labs (1994), a student who chose not to participate was docked 20 percent of his grade. In 1997, a group of students got together and hired one of the teaching assistants (TA) to give them a private tutorial. Last year, they were not allowed this option.
"UCSD is a very good medical school, ranking very high in national comparison," said Nancy Harrison, a local pathologist at Scripps Memorial Hospital in Chula Vista. "That must mean that the faculty is doing a good job, and I don't think it's because of the dog labs."
In a typical medical school animal laboratory, a dog is anesthetized and strapped to the table. Students observe the effects of various drugs on the heart rate and blood pressure. The dog is killed at the end of the demonstration.
"The dog labs are kind of an ancient holdover, in my opinion," Harrison said. "It's not science, it's not research, and it's never producing new information." Harrison believes the labs are old-fashioned compared to good computer alternatives.
"Dog labs vivisection in medical school is different from dogs being used in research in the various departments at the universities -- it should be really important and the animal should be pain free," Harrison said. "This issue of dog labs is much smaller than the looming, enormous questions of: Should animals ever be used in research, and if so, when and for what criteria?"
Years ago, dog labs were the norm in the United States and most medical schools utilized them, but year by year, fewer and fewer schools are using the labs. According to PCRM, the University of Southern California (USC), Stanford, Harvard and Yale, as well as the majority of the country's medical schools, now use innovative, clinical teaching methods instead of the old- fashioned dog labs.
'These labs provide an experience that is not possible to get any other way.' -- UCSD's Chief of the Division of Physiology.
The Chief of the Division of Physiology feels that the reason these other schools have given up animal labs has chiefly to do with expense. "I don't know of any medical school which has given up the labs because they think there are better ways of teaching," he said. "I think they do it because they can't afford to do it."
PCRM argues that the humane, high-tech and clinically-based alternatives teach students basic physiology, pharmacology and surgery concepts with interactive videodiscs, computer programs and CD- ROMs, or by observing actual human surgery in the operating room. This is much less costly and lessons can be repeated until they are learned. On the other hand, maintaining a live-animal lab -- which entails buying, shipping, housing, feeding and preparing the animals -- can cost tens of thousands of dollars per year more than modern alternatives.
The argument of the physiology and pharmacology departments at UCSD is that the educational value outweighs the expense. We feel that these labs provide an experience that is not possible to get any other way," The Chief of the Division of Physiology said. "Students are not required to take the dog labs; they can pick an alternative program, which I think, from an educational point of view, is not as good."
Former med student protests animal labs
La Jolla Village News
Letters to the Editor, November 26, 1998
Dog vivisection labs at UCSD School of Medicine are little publicized and tragically unnecessary. The public rightly requires that its medical schools produce well trained doctors and conduct research into cures for cancer and other diseases. Dog vivisection labs further neither of these goals.
The med school holds two dog labs, both during the freshman year, each lasting a full day. About thirty dogs are anesthetized and dissected alive for several hours, after which the students kill their dogs. The directors for these courses are not practicing physicians and they don't teach students how to operate on humans.
While every medical school in the U.S. has physiology and pharmacology classes, most do not use any dogs. Several of the most prestigious schools, such as Stanford, Yale, and the Mayo Clinic, don't use dogs. The fact is that dog labs take up only two days out of four years of "basic training" for doctors.
Most other schools don't need dog labs and neither do we. Excellent computer models exist that teach the same principles of physiology and pharmacology, and computer models are much less expensive than killing dogs. But no such alternative is offered here. Our students who object to wasteful dog labs are left to their own resources. The public expects its medical center to conduct research into cures for cancer and other diseases.
But new cures require new experiments with new results, and dog labs yield only the same result over and over. Every dog that dies at the hands of a medical student dies only to demonstrate the same basic physiology and pharmacology as the dog before him, and the dog before him. Dog labs will never help save you or someone you love from cancer.
So if dog labs aren't needed to train good doctors, and they won't help cure disease, why does UCSD still do this to dogs? There is no good answer. How can unnecessary vivisection ever be humane? Why teach our young doctors to callously take life? The better lesson is compassion. No "learning experience" at UCSD School of Medicine should result in a gruesome pile of corpses.
Nancy L. Harrison, M.D. 1996 graduate UCSD Dept. of Pathology.
In attempt to convey both sides of this
controversial issue to the first year class, Dr. Savoia held a meeting
with freshman medical students on 1-5-2000, and here is the letter from
Dr. Hansen which she read out loud.
First Year Med Students,
All MSIs at UCSD must soon make the first life or death decisions of their yet embryonic medical careers. You will be instructed by the physiology and pharmacology faculty to vivisect two purpose bred dogs, but you have the option of declining to participate in these vivisections if you choose. The physiology and pharmacology faculty will have many hours of contact with you before these labs, during which they will present their point of view, but before you decide whether or not to kill these dogs, we physicians opposed to dog vivisection want you to be aware of a few facts which the physiology and pharmacology faculty may not choose to emphasize.
Lawrence A. Hansen, MD
Associate Professor of Pathology
UCSD School of Medicine
Dear Dr. Harrison -
I am writing in response to your inquiries regarding the use of animals in the physiology
and pharmacology teaching laboratories for medical students. These laboratories provide
the students with a valuable experience of learning physiological and pharmacological
actions in a live model. Each year students study and observe the effects of cardiac
ischemia in physiology laboratories that used 24 animals this year.
Students working with faculty from anesthesia to study the effects of drugs commonly used
during cardiac emergencies involved the use of 28 animals this year.
These animals were all purchased from USDA Class A licensed vendors who raise animals
specifically for research. These animals are purpose bred mix-breed dogs.
I want to confirm the information that you have already received from my colleague, Leslie
Franz, that no dobermans have ever been used .
The use of animals in these laboratories, as well as any use of animals in research,
teaching and training at UCSD, is carefully reviewed by the institutional animal care and
use committee in order to assure that they are being treated humanely and that appropirate
analgesics and anesthetics are being given. Board certified laboratory animal
veterinarians and veterinary anesthesiologists provide consultation and oversight of these
activities.
I hope that this information helps to answer your questions.
Marky Pitts
Director, Animal Subjects Program
University of California, San Diego
Letter from the Information Practice Act Coordinator at UCSD
April 17, 2000
Dear Dr. Harrison,
This letter is to acknowledge receipt of your letter dated April 7, 2000 pertaining to "Dog Labs" at UCSD.
I appreciate your efforts to narrow your prior records request, based on the advice of Elisabeth Smith of my staff. However, because your revised request is still written in a question fonnat and does not identify specific records sought, this office cannot be of assistance at this time.
UCSD is not obligated to create new records in the course of responding to a Public Records Act request nor does the Act require us to research the contents of our records in order to answer questions from the public. In addition, in accordance with Gov. Code section 6255, we are not obligated to disclose records if the public interest served by not making the record public clearly outweighs the public interest served by disclosure of the record. Please be advised that, should you put your request for information in the form of a request for actual records, UCSD may assert that your request is burdensome unless the records sought are specific and identifiable. We also reserve the right to assert privileges and/or exemptions from disclosure of any such records based upon our assessment of the public interest.
As a courtesy, my Office forwarded your questions to UCSD's Public Information Office. Please find attached a fact sheet that may address your questions where the Public Records Act was not an appropriate vehicle for doing so.
Sincerely,
Stephanie Burke, Information Practice Act Coordinator
(The fact sheet follows)
University Communications Office of Animal Research Information
Facts about the Use of Animals in the Medical Teaching Laboratories
The animals which are used in the School ofMedicine teaching laboratories are obtained from vendors that specifically breed animals for research, teaching and training. These animal facilities are regulated and inspected by federal agencies in accordance with the Animal Welfare Act.
During the past five years, three animals were obtained from the County of San Diego, Department of Animal Control for these teaching laboratories. No pure bred animals were used from either commercial vendors or from the Department of Animal Control.
Animals obtained for teaching laboratories arrive several days prior to the laboratory . Trained animal health technicians provide daily husbandry, which includes clean, well- ventilated rooms; fresh, high-grade foods, and appropriate bedding, and continuously monitored environmental factors such as light, humidity and noise. They are pair housed when compatible.
During the past five years, the costs per animal are as follows:
2000 $440. 00
1999 $385.00
1998 $440.00
1997 $300.00, $400.00, $235.00
1996 $418.50, $235.00
UCSD is fully accredited with and voluntarily undergoes independent, intensive inspections by the Association for the Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care, International (AAALAC) in addition to adhering to the Animal W elfare Act and the Public Health Service Policy for the Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals.
Correspondence with the UCSD Vice Chancellor of Research
Dean Richard Attiyeh
Vice Chancellor of Research
University of California San Diego
9500 Gilman Drive La Jolla, CA 92093
5-23-00
Dear Dean Attiyeh,
I am writing as a medical colleague, UCSD residency graduate and concerned citizen of San Diego. By now you are aware of physician opposition to dog labs in the first year medical student curriculum at UCSD. Over 150 San Diego physicians, thirty of whom have faculty appointments at UCSD, have signed a petition expressing opposition to dog labs (attached). The facts can be stated succinctly. Each year about 60 purpose-bred dogs are killed in physiology and pharmacology labs at UCSD. Until this past year the labs were "optional" in name only. Most U.S. medical schools do not use animal labs in physiology, and it is extremely uncommon to kill dogs in medical school pharmacology courses (90% do not, see enclosures 1 and 2). Harvard, Yale, Stanford and Columbia teach their medical students without dog labs. Recently Johns Hopkins dropped their dog lab. Our faculty have stated that they believe dog vivisection is the best way to teach, but they offer no alternative for students who object for ethical or religious reasons. Numerous alternatives exist, including anything and everything which faculty at the majority of U.S. medical schools do to teach physiology and pharmacology.
Today I am writing to enlist your support in a matter which is under your purview as Vice Chancellor of Research. The Director of the Animal Subjects Program, Ms. Marky Pitts, is under your direct supervision. After great effort, through a tortuous route involving Dr. James Covell of the physiology department, Ms.Leslie Franz of the Dept. of Communications, Ms. Marky Pitts, Ms. Smith and Ms. Stephanie Burke of the Internal Audit/Management Advisory services--I am still unable to obtain facts regarding the procurement and handling of the dogs in "dog lab." Enclosed for your review are copies of my electronic and paper correspondence with university personnel (3-9). The partial response submitted with Ms. Burke's reply, "Facts About the Use of Animals in the Medical Teaching Laboratories," is welcome but far from complete. Ms. Burke says that her office cannot assist with a request submitted in question format "at this time." Several important questions have not been answered. The Director of the Animal Subjects Program has the information I want. Dean Attiyeh, this is a legitimate ethical issue (10,11,12). The questions are simple, germane and most assuredly NOT burdensome to answer. The public has every right to know how UCSD spends every tax dollar and treats every animal. Audit and Management Advisory Services has nothing to do with this. Stonewalling inquiries into a practice that is defended by the faculty is illogical; stonewalling medical colleagues is unprofessional; stonewalling the taxpayers is arrogant. The Director of the Animal Subjects Program reports to your office. Please instruct Ms. Pitts to immediately and completely answer all questions detailed below.
Thank You,
Nancy L. Harrison, M.D.
1. What is the USDA Class A license number for the vendor(s) from
whom the purpose-bred dogs for the past 2 years were purchased?
2. In the past 5 years has UCSD used any pure-bred purpose-bred dogs for the MS1 teaching
labs?
3. When If ever has a representative of UCSD physically and in person inspected the
current facility? Please be as specific as possible, e.g. name and date and outcome/report
of Inspection. No boilerplate policy reply, thank you.
4. For the past 2 years, how and by whom are the animals transported from the breeding
facility to UCSD? Please include mode and duration of transport.
5. How long and under what conditions are the dogs held at UCSD prior to the labs? Please
be as specific as possible, e.g. holding period plus/minus 25%, kennel size range, feeding
and exercise approximate schedules, etc.
6. In the past 5 years did UCSD use "pound dogs" from San Diego Dept of Animal
Control or from any other municipal shelter for the MS1 dog lab?
enclosures:
1) "Use of Live Animals in the Curricula of U.S. Medical Schools in 1994,"
Ammons. Academic Medicine, vol. 70, no. 8, August 1995.
2) Medical School Curricula With No live Animal Laboratories
3) email from Pitts to Harrison 3-22-00 10:58
4) email from Harrison to Pitts 3-22-00 18:05
5) registered letter from Harrison to Pitts 3-30-00
6) email from Pitts to Harrison 3-30-00
7) letter from Harrison to Burke (delivered by hand) 4-7-00
8) letter from Burke to Harrison 4-17-00
9) "Facts About the Use of Animals in the Medical Teaching Labs" UCSD
10) American Medical Student Association position on provision of information to students
about animals; optional status of and alternatives for animal labs.
11) "Dog Lab: A Question of Rite and Wrong," JAMA 1991
12) "U. Colorado Med School No Longer Using Controversial Dog Supplier for
Labs," Terje Langeland. Colorado Daily, Boulder Co, 5-1-00.
Petition from San Diego physicians attached.
cc: Leslie Franz, Dept. of Communications
Marky Pitts, Director, Animal Subjects Program
Elisabeth Smith, Internal Audit Department
Stephanie Burke, Information Practice Act Coordinator, Audit and Management
The Vice Chancellor's Reply:
July 5, 2000
Dear Dr. Harrison,
I am writing in response to your letter of May 23, 2000 requesting additional information regarding the use of animals in medical teaching laboratories. The following are answers to the four questions you posed on page 2 of your letter:
1 . We choose not to provide you with this information. Unfortunately, we are aware of instances where Vendors have been subject to vandalism and other forms of illegal activities. Because we do not wish to subject them to this possibility, we do not disclose information of this type in response to inquiries.
2. While UCSD personnel make an effort to visit and inspect as many of our animal vendors as possible, we rely on the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to exercise its responsibility under the Animal Welfare Act to assure that these vendors provide humane care to their animals. Based on our experience, it is evident that the USDA conscientiously meets its obligations.
3. For the same reasons as indicated in item #1 above, we choose not to provide you with information about who transports animals from the vendors to UCSD. They are also regulated by the USDA, and it has been our experience that the animals arrive in good condition.
4. This question was answered in document #9, Facts About the Use of Animals in the Medical Teaching Laboratories. We follow the recommendations of the enclosed Guide for the Care and Use of Animals published by the National Research Council.
Thank you for your interest in the humane care and use of animals.
Sincerely,
Richard Attiyeh
Vice Chancellor for Research
Dear Dr. Harrison -
I have received the information you requested regarding the numbers of animals used for the medical teaching laboratories this year:
Physiology -- 17 animals
Pharmacology -- 17 animals
As indicated previously, the animals are humanely euthanized at the end of each session while under anesthesia. The cost per animal is approximately $410.00
Marky Pitts
Director
Animal Subjects Program
Doctors Against Dog Labs.Copyright©1999-2008.