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Monday, February 21, 2000
8A
KU conducts confidential animal testing
Bv Todd Holstead
Kansan staff writer
Peering through a ubiquitous steel cage lined with blurring lines of bars are nervous round eyes. The sizable New Zealand white rabbit waits with legs so powerful that its back could easily snap when it kicks if improperly restrained outside of the cage.
The rabbit is one of about 2,000 animals at the University of Kansas involved in 100 investigations in Malott Hall. Observing the practices of the investigators and their research is the University's Animal Care Unit and its Animal Care Committee.
James Bresnahan, doctor of veterinarian medicine and director of the Animal Care Unit for the past 15 years, said that the department's main mission was to observe animal research at the University of Kansas. Because the research conducted was confidential, Bresnahan said he could not disclose specific research protocols.
there is animal care and use here," he said. "There are animals we exhibit at museums, for teaching physiology lab, and there are animals for use in medical research or testing."
Bresnahan said he could not disclose where the animals came from.
Michael Schmitt, Harrisonburg, Pa., graduate student and member of the Proponents for Animal Liberation, a campus animal-rights organization, said that he was against animal testing and that his group wanted to educate people about animal-rights violations.
"I know there is testing at KU, and it makes me sad," he said. "But what's even worse is to think about all the other universities and places where this is widespread."
Nancy Schwarting, supervisor of training and service at the Animal Care Unit, said that research animals at the University were well-cared for and protected by governmental regulations.
"This activity is highly scrutinized, and the noose always gets tighter and tighter with more and more regulations," she said. "It's virtually impossible to do something not acceptable."
Bresnahan said that the Animal Welfare Act and the Public Service Act protected animals being used for research and required that every research center have an animal care unit and committee.
that included a scientist, a person not affiliated with the research, a non-scientist and a veterinarian. The committee at KU, on which Bresnahan serves as a veterinaryian, approves research proposals, oversees the research and ensures optimal care for the animals.
Bresnahan said that the Animal Care Unit had three missions: to ensure the care of animals, to administer procedures for the Animal Care Committee, and to instruct researchers.
"Anybody doing any procedure with animals here on campus either has to be trained by us or they have to observed by us," he said. "We have graduate students doing research who may never have used animals, who may never have given a shot or not know how to hold animals. So one of our jobs is to train these people."
About 90 percent of the animals are rats and mice; the remainder are snakes, frogs, rabbits, hamsters, dogs, cats and other animals.
The USDA stated in its Animal Welfare Enforcement Report for fiscal year 1997 that there were 1,267,828 animals registered by centers for research purposes in the United States. The Office of Technology Assessment, however, reported that the USDA study accounted for only 10 percent of the total animals researched.
According to a study by the National Research Council's Institute of Laboratory Animal Resources, animals used in research in the United States peaked near 1970. Since then, it has dropped 50 percent.
Bresnahan said that the USDA placed research into three categories: research without pain, painful research with anesthesia and painful research without anesthesia. He said that most of the research at the University of Kansas was either painless or conducted with anesthesia.
The Animal Care Unit has a number of rooms in which to administer research and treatment to animals, including a room with a surgical table for larger animals and areas for dogs and cats to exercise
There also is an X-ray room, a relic from when the department rehabilitated animals in the early 1980s. The equipment continues to be used to diagnose problems in research animals.
In 1992, state and federal budget cuts caused the department to abandon its
rehabilitation practice, but the practice survives at Wild Care, a nonprofit organization located outside of Lawrence that now relies on public and private donations. Schwarting, who serves as the organization's director, said that the Animal Care Unit still contributed to rehabilitating iniured animals.
She said rats and mice, which are often euthanized after their research is conducted, are often fed to animals at Wild Care, but only if it is determined that the research had not endangered their safe consumption.
Schwarting said that smaller animals were euthanized in a chamber that is flooded with carbon dioxide.
"The humane part of it is they feel nothing, and they go to sleep immediately."
she said
In the room where euthanasia is performed, a waist-high incinerator and freezer for the deceased animals sit against the wall. Schwarting said that when a dog or cat had to be euthanized, which was not common, a toxic solution was administered.
Bresnahan said that people were often more concerned with research on dogs and cats. However, he said that only about 500,000 cats and dogs were used in research nationwide and that more than 10 million pets were euthanized in humane shelters each year.
"This is the most noble use of animals, because you're helping both animals and people," Bresnahan said.
Rooms throughout the basement in Malotti Hall are used for research procedures on various animals. Surgical tables where the research takes place are among the equipment in the room. Photo by Todd Halstead/KANSAN