Into the mouth of Hell
- the real face of vivisection
PETA's recent undercover investigation into contract testing company Covance's Virginia Laboratory in the US revealed atrocities that - even for those with the stomach for it - make it very hard going reading the report. But this is just the kind of harsh reminder we all need sometimes to strengthen our resolve and redouble our efforts to keep on fighting. The world of the laboratory animal is one of unspeakable horror - every minute of every day spent in every laboratory in the world is one of torment. This is NOT an exaggeration. Put simply, it is hell.
PETA's undercover investigator worked as a technician at the laboratory for eleven months; she documented countless violations of animal welfare laws, in direct contradiction of Covance's animal welfare statement, which claims that they treat animals with "care and respect."
The 28-minute video footage and accompanying report reads like something out of a torturer's manual, with terrified animals subjected to an endless array of procedures carried out on behalf of numerous clients. Primates scream in terror as tubes are driven down their nostrils and throats; they are pumped full of experimental drugs and substances, shackled and forced into draw tubes, denied basic veterinary relief for necrotic tissue, injuries, convulsions and vomiting, beaten and brutalized by technicians; they self-mutilate and are driven insane by their forced isolation and confinement in tiny metal cages from which they witness the torture and death of other animals at the hands of their jailers. "The [...] euthanasia procedure [...] was done inside the animal room and all of the monkeys sat in their cages, wide-eyed, watching their friends go limp on the table and be dumped in black
plastic baos."
Primates used at the facility are both wild-caught and purpose-bred. The terrified animals are subjected to systematic physical and verbal abuse on a regular basis, and technicians were recorded as punching and throwing sick animals around their cages, and beating them with metal bars. One example describes that "When one of the male monkeys, Ninja, would not open his mouth for dosing, R hit him in the face with the bite bar several times so hard it was audible, and she also used the bite bar to try and pry his mouth open. T told her, 'You're gonna kill him!' to which R responded, 'I'll ram it down his fucking throat.' As T caught the monkeys, he yelled at them, saying things like 'Dumb fuck,' 'Hold your fucking head up, dick,' and 'You little asshole.'" This was not an isolated incident.
One gruesome contract involved the two-week testing of an unknown substance on ten cynomolgus monkeys. The client expected deaths but wanted no veterinary requests entered - it was to be a case of death or nothing. The terrified monkeys were forced into plastic restraint tubes and dosed with ten-minute infusions into a leg vein and then bled at various intervals post dose, each time forced into the body tubes. Within a few hours of the first dosing, No. 23, a