PETA Members Should Opt Out Of Treatments Discovered By Lab Animal Experimentation
Since humans may die or die much sooner thanks to PETA’s efforts to stop not just wasteful and hurtful treatment of animals in lab conditions, but all use, they should protest in a truly meaningful way — by refusing treatment that came about through animal experimentation.
This post was inspired by a blog item by Edyta Zeilinska on The Scientist about FedEx and UPS and shipment of lab animals:
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) announced last week that two major carriers in the United States, FedEx and UPS, confirmed that they will not ship mammals for laboratory use, and restrict the shipment of some non-mammalian organisms. Neither UPS nor FedEx are major players the lab-animal shipping business, but the move does restrict the options for researchers and could limit the operations of small companies, such as Florida-based Xenopus Express, which relies on UPS to ship its laboratory-grade frogs.
…Charles Hewett, the executive vice-president and chief operating officer at the Jackson Laboratory, voiced his concern that such decisions are short-sighted. “[It's] troubling that the corporate leaderships of UPS, FedEx, and others yield to the pressure of a small minority who overlook the importance of what [animal research does] for preventing, curing and treating human disease,” he told Nature.
