-
-
Not So Happy Feet In Brazil
Thousands of dead penguins have been washing ashore Brazil's Rio De Janeiro beaches...
-
Army shoots live pigs for medical drill
The Army says it's critical to saving the lives of wounded soldiers. Animal-rights activists call the training cruel and outdated.
Despite opposition by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, the Army proceeded to shoot live pigs and treat their gunshot wounds in a medical trauma exercise Friday at Schofield Barracks for soldiers headed to Iraq.
Maj. Derrick Cheng, spokesman for the 25th Infantry Division, said the training was conducted as scheduled under a U.S. Department of Agriculture license and the careful supervision of veterinarians and a military Animal Care and Use Committee.
"It's to teach Army personnel how to manage critically injured patients within the first few hours of their injury," Cheng said.
The soldiers are learning emergency lifesaving skills needed on the battlefield when there are no medics, doctors or facility nearby, he said.
PETA, however, said there are more advanced and humane options available, including high-tech human simulators. In a letter, PETA urged the Army to end all use of animals, "as the overwhelming majority of North American medical schools have already done."
"Shooting and maiming pigs is outdated as Civil War rifles," said Kathy Guillermo, director of PETA's Laboratory Investigations Department.
The Norfolk, Va.-based group demanded the exercise be halted after it was notified by a "distraught" soldier from the unit, who disclosed a plan to shoot the animals with M4 carbines and M16 rifles.
"There's absolutely no reason why they have to shoot live pigs," PETA spokeswoman Holly Beal said.
The bloody exercise, she said, is difficult for soldiers because they sometimes associate the animals with their own pets.
Cheng said the exercise is conducted in a controlled environment with the pigs anesthetized the entire time. He had "no doubt whatsoever" in the effectiveness of the instruction, which he called the best option available at the base.
"Those alternative methods just can't replicate what the troops are going to face when we use live-tissue training," he said. "What we're doing is unique to what the soldiers are going to actually experience."
Cheng didn't have details about the number of pigs, how they were acquired or the weapons involved in the training.
The soldiers being trained are with the 3rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, which is deploying to Iraq this year.
"We understand (PETA's) concerns and point of view. At the same, the Army is committed to providing the soldiers with the best training possible," Cheng said.
PETA has instructed its 2 million members to inundate the Army with calls and e-mails.
"We are not going to let it drop," Guillermo said Friday. "We'll continue to press both Schofield and the Department of Defense for a ban on these trauma training exercises." The Army says it's critical to saving the lives of wounded soldiers. Animal-rights activists call the training cruel and outdated... more -
8 Signs the Animal Kingdom Is Out of Whack
A polar bear clinging to a melting iceberg may the poster child for global warming, but rising temperatures, pollution and other human activity are also affecting the animal kingdom in far subtler ways. Like the proverbial canary in the coal mine, the natural world could be giving us other signs that human intervention has knocked it way off kilter.
Some recent examples:
1. Earlier Migration: Several bird species are making their annual northward jaunt slightly ahead of schedule in recent springs, as the East Coast of the United States heats up, according to a study detailed in the June issue of the journal Global Change Biology.
2: Jellyfish Rule: An outbreak of jellyfish in oceans across the planet has resulted from the stinging creatures hitching rides on ships that circumnavigate the globe.
3: Food Web Contaminated. Scientists said last month that they found toxic pollutants in nine deep-sea species of cephalopods, a class of mollusks that includes octopuses, squid, cuttlefish and nautiluses.
...(check for more) A polar bear clinging to a melting iceberg may the poster child for global warming, but rising temperatures, pollution and other human... more -
Which grocery stores carry certified humane raised and handled animal products?
Click on the link to find out which grocery stores in your area carry certified humane raised and handled animal products.
-----------------
Humane Farm Animal Care (HFAC) is a non-profit organization created to offer a certification and labeling program for meat, eggs, dairy and poultry products from animals raised according to Humane Farm Animal Care’s Animal Care Standards. Developed with the welfare of the individual animal in mind, Certified Humane standards ensure that the animal is treated humanely and in accordance with the highest farm animal welfare standards available today, as the animal is raised, transported and processed. Click on the link to find out which grocery stores in your area carry certified humane raised and handled animal products. ... more -
Goldfish care: Everything you need to know!
Goldfish are fantastic, low-maintenance pets. Before you jump in with both feet, though, you have to know how to properly care for them so that they don't end up in the big fishbowl in the sky.
So what do you do to keep these little swimmers happy? Goldfish are fantastic, low-maintenance pets. Before you jump in with both feet, though, you have to know how to properly care for the... more
-
related topics
Animal Care
Contributors (8)
Animal Care
