The harrowing lives of animal researchers; Vox, March 3, 2025

Celia Ford, Vox; The harrowing lives of animal researchers

"Alyssa’s experience is anything but rare. Animal research, while largely hidden from public view, is widespread across the life sciences. Animals are used in everything from safety testing for medicines, cosmetics, and pesticides to exploring open-ended questions about how the mind and body work. The drugs we take, the products we use, and the medical breakthroughs we celebrate have been made possible in large part by lab animals and the people who, in the name of science, kill them. 

While it’s difficult to find the exact number of scientists, veterinarians, and animal caretakers working in research facilities, we know that somewhere around 100 million animals — mice, rats, dogs, cats, rabbits, monkeys, fish, and birds, among others — are used for research and testing worldwide each year. Between 2011 and 2021, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) provided $2.2 billion in grants for an estimated 4,000 research projects involving animals.

Animal research is traumatic — obviously for the animals unlucky enoughto be involved, but also for many of the humans tasked with harming them. Yet from day one, institutions teach animal researchers that expressing discomfort is akin to weakness, or tantamount to dismissing the value of science altogether. To compete for increasingly rare tenure-track jobs, graduate students and postdocs have no choice but to learn to suppress their emotions and get the work done. Principal investigators, senior scientists who direct animal research labs, often don’t care whether inserting electrodes into a conscious, chronically ill monkey’s brain makes you squeamish. If you can’t handle the heat, they say, get out of the kitchen. 

“The costs have always been out there,” bioethicist and former animal researcher John Gluck said. “They’ve just been completely ignored.”"

She worked in animal research. Now she’s blocked from commenting on it.; The Washington Post, May 6, 2024

 Rachel Weiner, The Washington Post; She worked in animal research. Now she’s blocked from commenting on it.

"For a long time, Madeline Krasno didn’t tell other animal rights advocates that she had worked in a monkey research lab as a college student. It had taken her years to understand her nightmares and fragmented memories as signs of post-traumatic stress disorder. And some activists could be vicious to former lab workers.

But four years after she graduated from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, Krasno started posting online about her experiences. Eventually, she started tagging the school in those posts and then commenting on its pages.

Many of those comments disappeared. As she would later learn, it was not a mistake or a glitch. Both the university and the National Institutes of Health were blocking her comments. Now with support from free speech and animal rights organizations, she is suing both institutions."

Vote now in the 2022 Morgridge Ethics Cartooning Competition; Morgridge Institute for Research, February 11, 2022

Morgridge Institute for Research ; Vote now in the 2022 Morgridge Ethics Cartooning Competition

"Sixteen cartoons have been selected as finalists in the 2022 Ethics Cartooning Competition, an annual contest sponsored by the Morgridge Institute. 

The competition encourages ethics conversations and deliberation among scientists conducting biomedical research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and affiliated biomedical research centers or institutes.

A panel of judges has chosen the following cartoons for display to the public. You can vote below and help determine the 2022 winners! 

This year’s cartoons depict a variety of research ethics topics, such as the ethics of scientific funding and publishing, the moral status of brain organoids, the ethics of experimenting on animals, environmental and social impacts of science, and problems of communication between scientists and non-scientists."

U.S. lab chimps were dumped on Liberia’s Monkey Island and left to starve. He saved them.; The Washington Post, December 12, 2019

Danielle Paquette, The Washington Post; U.S. lab chimps were dumped on Liberia’s Monkey Island and left to starve. He saved them.

 

"Animal testing has existed since doctors in ancient Greece studied the anatomy of rodents — an estimated 115 million creatures are still used each year in research worldwide — but rarely is the aftermath so visible. Rarely is it so hungry.

 

This colony of 66 chimpanzees, which never learned to survive in the wild, eats roughly 500 pounds of produce each day, plus a weekly batch of hard-boiled eggs for protein. They rely on money from a charity abroad and the devotion of men who’ve known them since they lived in steel cages."

American Association for Laboratory Animal Science (AALAS)

American Association for Laboratory Animal Science (AALAS) :

"About AALAS

Mission Statement: AALAS is an association of professionals that advances responsible laboratory animal care and use to benefit people and animals.

The American Association for Laboratory Animal Science (AALAS) is a membership association of professionals employed around the world in academia, government, and private industry who are dedicated to the humane care and treatment of laboratory animals, as well as the quality research that leads to scientific gains that benefit people and animals. AALAS provides educational materials to laboratory animal care professionals and researchers, administers certification programs for laboratory animal technicians and managers, publishes scholarly journals, supports laboratory animal science research, and serves as the premier forum for the exchange of information and expertise in the care and use of laboratory animals.

AALAS Goals can be viewed here.

Core Values Statement

The American Association for Laboratory Animal Science believes that the use of laboratory animals in scientific and medical research is essential to the improvement and protection of the quality of all life. The humane and responsible care of laboratory animals is vital to quality research and, as such, an essential aspect of AALAS endeavors. AALAS is dedicated to building and disseminating a knowledge base in laboratory animal science for the education and training of those who work in this field.

Code of Ethics

The Code of Ethics for members of AALAS has been adopted by the Board of Trustees to promote and maintain the highest standards of professional and personal conduct among its members. Adherence to these standards is required for membership in the Association and serves to assure public confidence in the integrity and service of AALAS members."