The USDA has demonstrated that it is more concerned about protecting the reputations of facilities that violate the law while using animals in cruel and useless experiments.
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A group of organizations including the Physicians Committee for
Responsible Medicine—a national nonprofit of more than 12,000
doctors—ended its lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture
on Friday after the agency announced a set of policies for the
disclosure of animal welfare records. The change comes after years
of court battles stemming from the USDA’s abrupt shutdown of its
online animal welfare database in February 2017. That same month,
the Physicians Committee, PETA, Born Free USA, the Beagle Freedom
Project, and Lewis & Clark Law School Assistant Clinical Professor
and Animal Law Litigation Clinic Director Delcianna Winders filed a
lawsuit against the agency.
Some records had been returned to the database in August 2017 and
others were posted in 2020 following the passage of an
appropriations bill in which Congress, responding to public
pressure, mandated full restoration of the database. But experts at
the Physicians Committee remained concerned that the USDA had not
complied with Congress’s request and could regress to its previous
practices.
The USDA’s new declaration states that the agency will post
inspection reports of animal research laboratories and other
facilities regulated under the Animal Welfare Act, warning letters
sent to facilities, and legal settlements with violators. In
addition, the agency will make public its “teachable
moments”—controversial documents often created instead of citing
facilities for a “noncompliance” on an official inspection report.
Critics claim that teachable moments are designed to shield animal
users from public scrutiny, but USDA has not posted the records on
its database.
The online documents have been essential to the Physicians
Committee’s work to end scientifically unsound, cruel experiments.
The USDA inspection reports from the Southwest National Primate
Research Center in San Antonio, Texas, revealed many troubling
incidents, including a necropsy performed on a baboon who was still
alive and a monkey who escaped and was euthanized the following day
due to hypothermia after spending the night outdoors. Subsequently,
the National Institutes of Health halted the transfer of 186
chimpanzees to that facility and eventually ended the funding of
chimpanzee experiments altogether.
In addition, the USDA inspection reports from Harvard’s New England
National Primate Research Center revealed that a critically
endangered primate known as a cotton-top tamarin was found dead
after going through a machine that uses near-boiling water and
caustic chemicals to wash cages. Several other similar incidents
ultimately led to the closure of the facility.
“This is an important step,” said Physicians Committee Vice
President of Legal Affairs Mark Kennedy. “The USDA has demonstrated
that it is more concerned about protecting the reputations of
facilities that violate the law while using animals in cruel and
useless experiments. But we will monitor the agency’s compliance
with this declaration to ensure transparency, and we will continue
to push the USDA to improve its enforcement of the Animal Welfare
Act.”
The plaintiffs were represented in the lawsuit by public interest
firm Eubanks & Associates, LLC.