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Doctors Notify Medical Schools That Use of Live Animals for Student Training Exercises Is Unlawful
Only a Handful of U.S. Medical Schools Still Use Live Animals as Teaching Tools; New York Is Worst Offender, While All Nine Medical Schools in Illinois Now Use Humane Alternatives
WASHINGTON—Twelve medical schools across the country received
notice today from the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
(PCRM) that their use of live animals in student training exercises
is unlawful under the federal Animal Welfare Act because alternatives
are readily available.
Twenty years ago, live dogs were commonly used in physiology,
pharmacology, and surgery classes in medical schools. But today,
as PCRM’s letter to the 12 schools notes, the large majority
of U.S. medical schools, including Harvard, Stanford, and Yale,
no longer use live dogs, pigs, or other animals as teaching tools.
The list of medical schools that do not use animals for teaching
continues to grow, with the recent additions of the University
of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign College of Medicine and East
Tennessee State University James H. Quillen College of Medicine.
“Dogs are so trusting, and it is a betrayal of that trust
to use them in teaching exercises that end in their death,” says
PCRM medical advisor John J. Pippin, M.D., F.A.C.C. “Humane
alternatives such as life-like patient simulators are more effective
teaching tools, which is why most of the nation’s medical
schools have done away with crude, obsolete dog labs and replaced
them with more clinically relevant teaching methods. It is now
time for the handful of remaining schools to phase out their
live animal laboratories.”
In a letter sent to each medical school’s Institutional
Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC), Dr. Pippin notes that
the federal Animal Welfare Act mandates the use of alternatives
in place of live animals when alternatives are adequate for the
stated purpose. If the IACUCs, which oversee animal use at the
medical schools, do not respond within a month, PCRM will file
a complaint with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which enforces
the Animal Welfare Act.
Four of the medical schools that still use dogs and other animals
as teaching tools are located in New York state, while all nine
Illinois medical schools use humane alternatives. The schools
that received PCRM’s letter are New York Medical College,
Mount Sinai School of Medicine, Stony Brook School of Medicine,
University of Rochester School of Medicine, St. Louis University
School of Medicine, University of Mississippi Medical Center,
Louisiana State University at New Orleans School of Medicine,
University of Tennessee College of Medicine, University of California,
San Diego, School of Medicine, Oregon Health and Science University,
School of Medicine, Uniformed Services University of the Health
Sciences School of Medicine, and Georgetown University School
of Medicine.
Founded in 1985, the Physicians Committee for Responsible
Medicine is a nonprofit health organization that promotes preventive
medicine, especially good nutrition. PCRM also conducts clinical
research studies, opposes unethical human experimentation,
and promotes alternatives to animal research.
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Physicians Committee for Responsible
Medicine
5100 Wisconsin Ave., N.W., Ste. 400, Washington, DC 20016
Phone: 202-686-2210 | E-mail: pcrm@pcrm.org |
