CU Records Reveal That Cruelty, Incompetence, and Neglect Continue Despite Official USDA Warning Following PETA Investigation
For Immediate Release:
January 29, 2012
Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382
Denver -- PETA has filed formal complaints with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) calling for fines and the revocation of federal grants awarded to the University of Colorado–Denver (CU). New documents obtained by PETA through a Colorado Open Records Act request to CU reveal that dozens of possible violations of federal animal welfare law and guidelines have occurred in the university's laboratories during just the past two years. This is despite the school's receiving an official warning from the USDA in 2009 cautioning CU that further animal welfare violations could carry fines of $10,000 per incident. The 2009 warning was issued in response to PETA's 2007 investigation at the university, which revealed that sick and injured animals were denied veterinary care and that the school's animal experimentation oversight committee consistently failed to properly monitor animal use in laboratories.
"If public scrutiny and an official government warning couldn't compel CU to stop mistreating animals, then clearly more serious action needs to be taken," says PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk. "The USDA and NIH should not allow CU to continue to violate federal animal protection laws and guidelines with impunity, and the school should not be rewarded for its bad behavior with more of the public's money."
Since 2009, CU has allowed the following animal welfare violations to occur, some of which were apparently not reported to authorities:
- A worker broke a rabbit's back while restraining her. The paralyzed animal was still used in an experiment before she was finally killed.
- Experimenters induced cancer in animals and then ineptly sliced off the resulting tumors, leaving the animals—who were given no pain relief—with large, gaping wounds.
- Twenty guinea pigs died after a worker injected them with an antibiotic intended for rats.
- Live mice and rats were found crawling in a freezer where dead animals were discarded.
- An employee dumped a box of live animals into the trash, where the animals died slow, painful deaths.
Video footage from PETA’s 2007 investigation is available here. For more information, please visit PETA.org.