University of Connecticut Daily Campus
Issue date: 9/15/06 Section: News

UConn Covers Up Animal Abuse
By Andrew Porter

Accusations of gross negligence in animal care have resulted in a formal
complaint and request for fines against the UConn Health Center (UCHC) being
submitted to the USDA by Justin Goodman, a UConn graduate student.

Goodman, the president of the UConn Animal Rights Collective, first brought
the issue to light in 2005, when he began protesting research on four rhesus
macaque monkeys preformed by Dr. David Waitzman at the UCHC. According to
what Goodman said in an article in the Jan. 3 issue of The Daily Campus, the
experimentation involves drilling a hole into the monkey's head and
implanting coils in the eyes.

Goodman's accusations are in direct opposition to a May 2, "Letter to the
University Community" from UConn President Philip Austin which stated, "We
dealt successfully with problems related to research animal care."

The allegations stem from the Nov. 21 death of a monkey named Cornelius. The
death was first publicly acknowledged in a Jan. 23 letter from Dr. Peter J.
Deckers, the executive vice president for Health Affairs at the UCHC. "A
thorough review of animal care records and related documents regarding Dr.
Waitzman's research shows that it has been conducted in compliance with U.S.
Public Health Service policies and regulations," said the letter from Deckers.

In his complaint, Goodman details a more than six-month long pattern of
seizures and strange behavior that led up to the death of Cornelius.

"Until January we had been protesting purely on moral and ethical grounds,"
Goodman said. "We had given the benefit of the doubt to the researchers in
terms of their following legal guidelines, but the death raised red flags."

After learning of the death in January, Goodman used the Freedom Of
Information Act to get a copy of a Nov. 28 USDA inspection of the research
facility. The inspection resulted in three citations. The two which concerned
Goodman were for an improper search for alternative means of study and
insufficient veterinary care. None of the citations are mentioned in the
letter sent two months later by Deckers.

However, the inspection did not mention the death of Cornelius, which had
occurred a week earlier. As a result, Goodman contacted the USDA and
requested a second inspection.

The second inspection, which occurred on March 7 and 8, resulted in five
additional citations.

According to the Inspection Report, guidelines cited as not being followed
include: "Procedures involving animals will avoid or minimize discomfort,
distress, and pain to the animals," and, "Animals that would otherwise
experience sever or chronic pain or distress that cannot be relieved will be
painlessly euthanized at the end of the procedure or, if appropriate, during
the procedure."

The report also said animals were not given appropriate pain reducers or
sedatives when they were forced to endure more than momentary or slight pain.
Also, not all the people working with the individuals were appropriately
trained and a complete description of the proposed use of the animals was not
available.

These citations were evaluated by the Institutional Animal Care and Use
Committee (IACUC). According to Goodman's formal complaint to the USDA, a
member of the IACUC from the UCHC agreed with Goodman that the coils inserted
into the eyes of the monkeys as part of Waitzman's research are an outdated
research method and could be replaced with infrared reflection technology.

Waitzman however has not changed his research methods. According to Goodman,
he has kept the same method because the majority of his peers still employ
it. Goodman claims in his complaint that this is an inadequate defense of
Waitzman's methods and if it were acceptable to merely perform something
because of similarity with peers, then science would never advance.

According to Goodman, the IACUC completed its attempts to address the cited
issues in July, two months after Austin's statement said the issue had
already been dealt with successfully. Dr. Waitzman's research continued
throughout the IACUC proceedings, and still does.

When contacted for comment the UCHC released a statement entitled "Response
to Animal Research Protest" which states, in part, "The UConn Health Center
is committed to full compliance with all relevant animal welfare laws and
guidelines followed by major research universities throughout the country. We
constantly monitor and evaluate our use of animals in research to remain in
compliance and improve the quality of our animal care activities."

The statement also states that since 1977 the UCHC has been accredited by the
Association for Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care,
International (AAALAC). The organization is a nonprofit, independent
organization.