Features: PETA Rewards Shelters for Ethical Decision to Dump Iams For years, Iams has exploited animal shelters’ lack of funds by providing them with money and/or free or discounted food, essentially buying the support of these organizations, which would most likely refuse any association with Iams if they knew about the company’s gruesome experiments on animals. But now, thanks to PETA’s vigorous campaign, more and more animal shelters around the world are making the ethical choice to drop Iams in favor of the wide selection of companion-animal food products that are not tested on animals. To thank the many animal shelters that have signed a statement of assurance promising not to “promote or publicize Iams, use Iams food, request Iams food donations, take Iams’ money, allow Iams to sponsor [their] events, or pass out ‘Iams Starter Kits’ to patrons,” PETA entered the shelters into a cash-prize drawing worth $1,500 to be used to further their animal protection efforts! http://www.iamscruelty.com/iams-feat-giveaway.asp
Here's a video: http://www.iamscruelty.com/iams-video.asp Another link: http://www.iamscruelty.com/iams.asp
Odd there is not one indication that Iams uses subcontracting labs or what the response was. If this is such a damning situation why is PeTA not also similarly judeged for the refusal to turn animals in their care over to other shelters and instead euthanized them. :shock:
Are you in favor of animals from the general poulation (ie., shelter dogs) being subjected to the abuse of experimentation? If you are the same Satan Jr. from the other board, then I noticed that you advocate shooting dogs in the head with a "stinger" You do not have any credibility here. Would you like to tell us who you really are?
I advocate animals that are going to be euthanized anyway to be used for medical/veteranirian studies. After All the animal is going to be euthanized, why not be pragmatic about it and at least have some good come out of it?
Nice how you always assume experimentation is abuse. You do know that such over generalizations are easily disproven. Remember Pavlov's dog was used in an experiment, but I bet you will assume ringing a bell when feeding is abuse also. Yes, you asked if I had posted here so I decided to check it out. I have used a stinger (type of .22 ammo) to put down animals on the farm. At that time it was an hours drive to the nearest town that had a vet, if you could afford to take all of the strays there to be put down. There was, and still is, no animal control in that area and little police coverage. I would not expect everyone to understand the situation that did not experience it. Based on your prior posts, I doubt if you would understand even if you experienced it. I was unware that you had the power to determine creditibility given the caliber of your posts on that board. I believe that those who read the posts will make the determination for themselves. I am really me, thank you very much.
I agree. Back in the history of the Special Forces, they trained the medics in a very short course. The way they trained for gunshots were to take dogs from the pound who were going to be killed, put them to sleep and shot them. The medic had to trat the would using no antibiotics and if there was an infection there was going to be a big problem for that soldier. The dogs were treated to a lot of food and attention but finally euthanized as was the original plan. The only difference was in the end they helped to save the lives of many people who were injured and had to rely on an SF with medical training. I believe it was in the beginning of the Desert Shield and Desert Storm preparations when there was a similar program in Texas that raised the ire of the Animal Rights folks, but this one never allowed the animals to regain consciousness. The AR folks still raised enough of a stink to stop the training and thus endangered the lives of the soldiers who had to rely on that training if they had been injured in combat. I believe such a use would add a meaning to the death of animals that were going to be euthanized in any case.
It would seem from your support of PETA in this case and the stand they take on the testing of food for animals that both of you support the use of all general population animals in experiments. But now, thanks to PETA’s vigorous campaign, more and more animal shelters around the world are making the ethical choice to drop Iams in favor of the wide selection of companion-animal food products that are not tested on animals. It would seem to be logical if the food is not tested prior to marketing it is the animals to which it is fed who are the test subjects in the experiment of whether the food is or is not going to give the expected benefits. This by definition would be supporting the experimentation on general population animals by the owners in the attempt to find foods that would provide the benefits sought. I can see no other logic in this campaign.
No animal should die or be tortured for food testing. Period. Undercover video has shown that Iams abuses animals in their research.
I believe you will find that undercover video shows a laboratory contracted by Iams to do research was accused of abuse. I tend to discount edited video evidence in favor of the total investigation. Case in point was the vet in NJ who lost his license due to such an investigation. Once the three minute tape (for a period of over a year) which was provided to the media was replaced by a longer 20 minute version there was no abuse found and all of the prior convictions were overturned in the appeal.
2002-2003 Investigation For nearly 10 months during 2002 and 2003, we conducted an undercover investigation of an Iams contract testing facility. We documented animals living in deplorable conditions and being forced to endure cruel and unnecessary procedures, such as tubes being stuck down dogs¡¯ throats to force them to ingest vegetable oil. You can see video footage of our investigation for yourself at www.iamscruelty.com/iams-video.asp, which shows dogs languishing on the paint-chipped concrete floor after having chunks of muscle sliced from their thighs. This is irrefutable; it is caught on videotape; and it¡¯s important to remember that none of this is required by any law. Despite assurances in Iams' stated research policy that no dog or cat would ever be killed, our investigator documented the destruction of 27 out of 60 dogs who underwent the muscle slicing procedure. Two more of those dogs were found dead in their cages after the surgery; one had been suffering for 11 days before she died. To make matters worse, these unfortunate animals were denied even the barest comforts, such as being housed in pairs or even being given a simple resting board. On five separate occasions, Iams representatives themselves visited the facility and observed the following: dogs confined to small cages had gone cage-crazy (spinning and jumping from side-to-side); a retriever who had become a new mother had nothing on which to lie to nurse her puppies; and animals whose legs regularly got caught in the slats of the stainless steel cage floors. Yet Iams did nothing to resolve these problems. Iams Violating its Own Research Policy Iams has a long tradition of conducting gruesome experiments on animals and then lying about it after the fact. After thoroughly reviewing publicly available research documents for a study entitled ¡°Effects of Diet on the Initiation of Gingivitis¡± (that is being conducted by Dr. Roger Johnson at the University of Mississippi Medical Center with Iams¡¯ money through October 2005), we noticed a significant policy violation. Item number six of Iams¡¯ research policy (http://www.iamscruelty.com/iams-letters-1.asp) states the following: ¡°6. We will test our foods on groups of cats or dogs within the general population who already suffer from target diseases or conditions. However, we will not contract for, nor conduct, any study involving surgeries to create or mimic diseases such as diabetes, stroke, heart disease, kidney disease, or intentional damage to other organs; nor will the company use non-surgical methods to induce or simulate diseases that are not acceptable in nutritional or medical research on humans; nor will the company fund any university positions that may be involved in such activities for the study of cat and dog nutrition.¡± However, in Dr. Johnson¡¯s experiment, he is purposefully inducing gingivitis in 21 beagles. As you may know, gingivitis is a stage of periodontal disease that can result in serious health complications. The fact that Iams says on one hand that it won¡¯t induce disease in dogs, but then does just the opposite in its experiments, shows just how two-faced this company can be. Iams¡¯ acknowledgement of this policy violation, and its subsequent refusal to rectify the conflict, is strikingly similar to what happened during our undercover investigation. Iams¡¯ complacency to enforce its research policy is certainly no excuse for cruelty to animals. In addition, these animals are slated to be killed according to Dr. Johnson's research protocol--another direct violation of Iams' "no-kill" policy. Please visit http://www.iamscruelty.com/iams-feat-catsdie.asp for more details. Poor Exercise and Socialization Standards At the March 2004 Pet Food Forum, Iams¡¯ spokesperson, Dan Carey, stated that he believed that dogs and cats could spend their ¡°entire lives¡± in cages for laboratory studies. Iams¡¯ current welfare program states that dogs and cats need to receive a paltry thirty minutes a day, five days a week, of cage-free time (with no such provision during the weekend). This means approximately 165 hours a week of unrelieved anxiety, fear, boredom, depression, lack of social contact and inadequate exercise for these naturally gregarious and fun-loving animals. For years on end, they are deprived of forming the loving bonds with humans that they crave. By any stretch of the imagination, this is simply not right. Animal Experimentation Increasing at Iams¡¯ Main Facility On October 7, 2004, Iams caved in to pressure from PETA and announced that by October 2006 the company would move all of its outside testing into its own laboratories in Dayton, Ohio. While this appeared to be a small step in the right direction, it was revealed that Iams This obviously does not reflect an honest intent to stop these experiments. Dogs and Cats Aren¡¯t the Only Ones Suffering at Iams Iams recently gave Purdue University researchers $195,140 to conduct a study from May 1, 2004 through June 30, 2006, in which mice will be subjected to seven days of muscle atrophy(the wasting away of muscle tissue)by suspending their hind limbs to disable their ability to bear weight. After losing the use of their hind legs, the mice are scheduled to be killed and sliced up. We have written repeatedly to Procter & Gamble (Iams parent company) regarding the availability of a validated non-animal alternative (e.g., bioartificial muscle technology), but our call for alternatives have fallen on deaf ears. To learn more about this inhumane study, please visit www.iamscruelty.com/iams-feat-purdue.asp. Iams also conducts protein efficiency ratio (PER) experiments on baby chicks to test the digestibility of protein of the company's pet food. This test has been condemned by TNO Nutrition and Food Research¨C¨Can internationally-recognized authority in nutrition research¨C¨Cwhich states the following in issue 27 (December 2004) of Leads in Life Sciences: ¡°[T]hese experiments are extremely slow and give no insight into the availability of the amino acids that are responsible for growth limitation. The test may also result in strong growth retardation due to amino acid deficiencies and therefore has ethical drawbacks. Moreover, this method determines the requirements of rats and broilers [chickens], not of humans or dogs.¡± Despite these criticisms and the availability of validated non-animal systems like FIDO (functional gastro-intestinal dog model - www.voeding.tno.nl/Common/PDF/voe235e.pdf), and IDEA (Immobilized Digestive Enzyme Assay - com/Public/Products/IdeaBrochure.asp href="BLOCKED::http://www.novusint.com/Public/Products/IdeaBrochure.asp">http://www.novusint.com/Public/Products/IdeaBrochure.asp), Iams continues to harm chicks in PER experiments¨Dtests which neither Hill's Pet Nutrition nor Nestl¨¦ Purina PetCare Company (two of Iams' largest competitors) conduct. PETA persisted in pressing Iams to join the company¡¯s major competitors in abandoning the use of chicks in PER tests, and, on February 7, 2005, Iams confirmed that it was looking into using IDEA. But change will be tediously slow as Iams inexplicably insists on conducting its own validation studies for a system that¡¯s already been validated. The Bottom Line There is simply no reason why animals should be forced to suffer in pet food experiments, especially when humane alternatives abound. Iams has the financial wherewithal to change, and by working together, we in the humane community can help bring about that change by objecting to these cruel experiments and choosing to use products from one of more than 40 cruelty-free companion animal food companies (a list of which you may view at http://www.iamscruelty.com/res.asp).
So where is the direct supervision by Iams? You do understand the concept of a "contract laboratory" not having constant supervision and the ability to change the basic care procedures without the knowledge of the primary contracting agency, do you not?
I suppose they could try to ignore the caveat that no disease would be induced or simulated in an animal that is not acceptable in similar research with human subjects and not that there would be "no introduction of disease" as is claimed. This is the basic twisting of facts in the attempt to mislead the general public. The use of half and near truths is the key to a good propaganda program, and this has all of the indications of a decent propaganda program.
So just where have you seen humans treated this way? I've never heard of people having their legs broken for practice, or being injected with cancer and other diseases, or being restrained for months at a time, terrified, having their bowels blacked, etc, etc. By the way, I noticed in your profile that you have a research job. Would you care to tell us exactly what you do for a living?
Many denisty studies can and do allow gingivitis to form in the human participants. That was the example given in the "proof" Iams did not follow their own guidelines. I have never seen where it was proven that Iams did any of these things either. You do understand how context works do you not? Sure, I own and run and environmental laboratory specializing in the analysis of air samples. I have other companies, but thay deal with safety supplies and real estate and not related to the sciences.
