Chimps: Life in the Lab

McClatchy :

About 180 chimpanzees at a federal primate facility in the New Mexico desert are at the center of an impassioned debate between the National Institutes of Health and the animal-rights community. The NIH wants to move the chimps away from Alamogordo, where they'll be allowed to be put back into research. Animal-rights activists want them retired to a grassy sanctuary. The use of chimps in research has been a hot-button issue for years.

Read the whole story: McClatchy

Comments

[patililac]

03:59 AM on 04/26/2011

I thought I'd read that we were getting away from testing chimpanzees (that's what I get for thinking). It is so sick. I can understand why people eat meat (though not the farming practices), but submitting them to cruel procedures is entirely different. With all we've learned about primates, you'd think these people would understand how cruel it is. People say, well, it helps cure human disease. But with practices like this, I am not sure it proves humans should be saved.

[Master-T]

10:57 PM on 04/24/2011

"Life in the Lab" as a title? Seriously? How about this title instead: "Unending Misery and then Death in the Lab".

Here's a little anecdote that's relevant to this story. Smoking induced lung cancer studies are done on chimpanzees. Want to know how? It's actually hard to get a chimpanzee to smoke cigarettes so they strap the chimps down into secure harnesses. Of course, that doesn't solve the problem of getting the smoke into their lungs. So, humans being sooooooooo ingenious and smart and everything, created a little smoking device that they surgically install into the chimp's chest. The device has a little hole in it with a tube on the other end that goes into the chimp's lungs. Then, while the little fella is securely strapped in, the "scientists" place cigarette after cigarette into the device which forces smoke into the chimp's lungs. Day after day, month after month, year after year. Until the chimp's lungs are riddled with cancer.

This is true. I've seen the pictures.

This is what passes for such important medical testing today, that "scientists" tell us are essential to our well-being. Smokers, who are too stupid to know they are voluntarily inhaling a known carcinogen, are reason to torture these sentient creatures and sentence them to a life of unending misery.

Whatever this article tells you, it's worse than that. Way, way worse. If you love animals, get involved with the animals rights organization of your choice. End this madness.

[kkmousse]

08:42 PM on 04/24/2011

I remember that they used to use to inject rabbits with either blood or urine for a possible pregnant worman. To see if she was pregnant or not. If the rabbit died she was pregnant.
I am glad that we have evolved away from that way of letting people know one way or the other.
We need to get away from all animal testing. How many animals are collected from animal shelters and sold to testing places. I do not care how much more they charge at the shelter to deter this pactice. I am sure it still goes on and makes money for the person doing the collecting.
Lets give these poor animals some time to live out there lives in peace.

[wstraka]

07:50 PM on 04/24/2011

Maybe we can replace the chimps with Tea Partiers--Oops! Can't do that. The chimps are much smarter!

[Edy Williams]

06:09 PM on 04/24/2011

hOW would you like to be strapped up in a cage,wires inserted? no pain killers! then parts disected,torn,cut into, this is disgusting scam for "experimental" ACQUISITIONS! they SHOULD BE IN jAIL. (IT IS fraud).hOPE THE DEVIOUS kharma HITS THEM BACK IN THEIR FACES!

[lalou80]

04:23 PM on 04/24/2011

Send an email to the NIH now: http://RetireTheChimps.org/

Thanks McClatchy for in-depth coverage on what Lennie, Rex, Lira and all of New Mexico's chimpanzees forced into research have endured. The closer you look, the more problems you see. America can't afford to continue this research. http://RetireTheChimps.org/

[Edy Williams]

06:17 PM on 04/24/2011

it is expensive,we know the funds go in their pockets! the chimps dont get their bananas,or any kindness. they have to stomp it out, delete,cross it off the list! the funds can go to new oil wells, hospitals.! they are closing alot of paRks! what are the priorities here? edy

[Dana Dallabetta]

10:48 PM on 04/24/2011

Thanks for the link

[Stanton Cunningham]

04:10 PM on 04/24/2011

Lets put Big Ears in a caged lab.

[fourtruth]

03:55 PM on 04/24/2011

And we call ourselves civilization?

[pyllauracollins]

03:06 PM on 04/24/2011

We need to respond to this trash! http://www.seraph.net/2011/04/20/terrorism-eye-beholder-animal-rights-extremists-so-2/

[twoto2]

02:01 PM on 04/24/2011

Cruelty to animals is not new, but on the site Mercy for Animals people in west Texas have surpassed themselves. Killing calf's with Pix axes is not human and heavy hammers to beat their brains in. These people think nothing of it. All because they think the mother will give up more milk, which means more money. Can't have a quick shot to the head, no, have to pix axes their heads and throats and watch them die.

[Iammadashell]

01:43 PM on 04/24/2011

To assure the birthier crowd that HP has their back; printing and positioning of this story above the President story is so obvious it's enough to make some of us sick.

[Frenchie08]

01:54 PM on 04/24/2011

Thank you! I made a similar observation earlier in this post. Glad I am not the only one who had the same reaction/

[ashabot]

01:14 PM on 04/24/2011

Animal research is being conducted in most brutal, barbaric, inhumane conditions imaginable. Hell on earth. I'm a member of NAVS, the National Anti-Vivisection Society. Check it out. http://www.navs.org/

[olitenup]

12:01 PM on 04/24/2011

Well, here is the contact info for NIH, let them know you do not agreee with this form of animal abuse and to please stop.

[e-mail]
Contáctenos en Español

Phone
301-496-4000,
TTY 301-402-9612
Health Info Lines
Media Contacts

Mail
National Institutes of Health
9000 Rockville Pike
Bethesda, Maryland 20892

[ReadMyLipstick1]

10:47 AM on 04/24/2011

This issue is a double-edged sword for me - there's no question but what the experimentation on chimps have proven tremendously beneficial for the improvement and lengthening of human life. No one wants to see the chimps suffer or be treated in an environment of torture; an alternative is not easy. After having said that, I do hold human beings in higher esteem. I could not chose the life of a chimp over the life of a human being. It would be miraculous for there to be another way in which to test these new medical live-saving methods. However, I would surely promote a maximum time of service rule for chimps and other creatures having to be sacrificed for our benefit, and after that period, these creatures should be retired to an environment which they can live out their lives in safety.

[pcpc]

09:22 AM on 04/24/2011

Free the Chimps!!!