Animal Rights

Animal rights activists firebomb researchers' house, car

John Carroll — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 09:02:02 -0400

The house of UC Santa Cruz molecular biologist David Feldheim was firebombed, forcing his family to flee the burning building through a window in what police officials say was one of two attacks directed against biomedical researchers. In the other attack a researcher's car was firebombed in his driveway.

According to the university, these attacks are just the latest in a string of incidents involving California-based biomedical researchers who use animals in their studies. Last February masked intruders confronted a scientist in his home. Other researchers' homes have been vandalized and some have been targeted with harassing phone calls.

Late last year all 10 chancellors in the state's university system affirmed their support for the ethical use of animals in biomedical research. But California is becoming more and more like the UK, where animal rights groups have long used threats and harsh intimidation tactics to try to force scientists to stop the use of animals in their work.

- read the article in the New York Times

Protesters target the homes of research scientists

John Carroll — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 08:43:11 -0400

Animal rights activists are taking their fight to the streets--targeting the homes of scientists involved in biomedical research. Homes have been vandalized and scientists threatened for their work involving animals in medical research. Some activists use bullhorns to shout out their protest to the scientist's neighbors.

While the most extreme attacks have generally been reserved for the U.K., researchers say that there have been a growing number of incidents in the U.S. as activists adopt the confrontational tactics of anti-abortion groups to target the scientific community.

"It used to be everyone was worried about their laboratories being broken into and their data being destroyed, their animals being taken away," Jeffrey Kordower of the Society for Neuroscience's animal research committee tells the AP. "What they've decided to do now is make things more personal."

- read the AP report

New primate model for Huntington’s will help researchers

John Carroll — Tue, 20 May 2008 09:28:46 -0400

In a first, researchers have developed a primate model for Huntington's disease, eliciting harsh criticism from animal rights experts even as it paves the way for future primate models for a host of degenerative brain disorders. Five rhesus macaque monkeys now produce the rogue protein that leads to Huntington's. And the researchers say the work should help significantly advance work on a cure.

Mice have been used in neurodegenerative research, but don't demonstrate the same kind of symptoms that scientists look for. With the engineered monkeys, researchers will be able to get a much better understanding of the disease and better ways it can be treated in humans.

- read the story from New Scientist