The
Committee for Research Accountability (CRA), a project
of In Defense of Animals (www.idausa.org),
continues to call upon the University of Colorado at
Denver Health Sciences Center (CU) to release and retire
ALL monkeys from their facility. The total number of
primates at CU is approximately 51 (previously 34). CU
recently agreed to release 11 to a sanctuary.
For 17
years, CU researcher Mark Laudenslager subjected macaque
monkeys to maternal separation experiments to analyze
the effects of separating infants from their mothers.
One can only imagine the terror and confusion of the
mother when her baby was torn from her. After being
taken from their mothers, babies can experience severe
depression, anxiety, loneliness, fear and lifelong
psychological consequences.
These
experiments were widely known and condemned by many
because they were considered to be archaic, unnecessary
and of questionable applicability to human health. After
many years of public scrutiny, this study ended in
October 2003. At that time, CRA approached CU to ask
for the retirement of the monkeys to a sanctuary. CU’s
Vice-Chancellor of Research John Sladek responded by
saying it would cost $10,000 to $15,000 per monkey for
their release.
Laudenslager soon devised yet another ridiculous idea
for how to use/abuse monkeys. Since July 2004 he has
been “working” to determine if poor mothering in monkeys
is a contributing factor to alcohol abuse in adolescent
monkeys. For the first year alone, this study, which
was funded by the National Institutes of Health, cost
taxpayers nearly $800,000.
Now,
because of negative press attention and pressure from
citizens, CU has decided to rid themselves of the
monkeys. They are considering giving them, free of
charge, to Wake Forest University (WFU) in
Winston-Salem, North Carolina. However, Laudenslager
expects to continue the alcohol project. He will direct
the study from CU’s Health Sciences Center in Denver,
but the monkeys will be housed 2,000 miles away in North
Carolina. In that way, CU hopes to silence our voices,
while continuing this wasteful study. This charade is
simply geography and will accomplish nothing of value.
In fact, there will now be additional costs for
Laudenslager to travel back and forth to WFU.
Based on
WFU documentation, after the alcohol study is completed,
the monkeys will then be subjected to additional
experiments at WFU or sold to other facilities for their
“use”. The monkeys have no say in their future.
Newspapers have quoted CU officials talking about the
need for openness and transparency at the university.
However, once again they are trying to dodge the real
issue.
WE NEED YOUR HELP NOW: Please
send an email to CU (email addresses are below) to ask
them to 1) terminate Laudenslager’s embarrassing
project, and 2) allow the monkeys to be retired to
sanctuaries with funding from CU. It is time
institutions such as the University of Colorado learn
they cannot continue to “use” sentient beings, then
throw them out like leftover cabbage.
We ask
that you also email Wake Forest University officials
(email addresses are also below) and urge them to refuse
the offer of free monkeys, and thereby save themselves
the unwelcome attention of activists and media which
will follow the monkeys.
