April 27, 2006
Contact: Rita Anderson (303) 527-3372 or (303) 618-3227 (cellular)
“We shouldn’t be expanding the primate research centers, we should be shutting them down.”
-Dr. Jane Goodall
Raleigh, N .C.-- In Defense of Animals (IDA)’s shocking television announcement featuring world-renowned primatologist, conservationist, and animal ambassador, Dr. Jane Goodall condemning the horrors of primate research will air on several Raleigh-area TV stations this week to coincide with World Week for Animals in Laboratories (WWAIL), April 23-30. The ad seeks to educate the public about the misery that monkeys and apes, who share our basic needs for companionship, love, and freedom, suffer in labs as the University of Colorado (CU) prepares to transfer a colony of bonnet macaque monkeys, used in controversial experiments, to Wake Forest University’s Winston Salem medical center . In a calm yet urgent voice, Jane makes a powerful case for compassion while viewers see shocking footage of abused monkeys that was shot secretly by IDA’s Matt Rossell.
The ad will air in Raleigh on CNN, Fox News and News 14 Raleigh all week long. You can also view this ad on IDA’s web site at http://www.idausa.org/psas/psa.html. Broadcast quality copies of IDA’s ad, featuring Jane Goodall are available upon request.
For 17 years, Mark Laudenslager has used a colony of bonnet macaque monkeys to study the effect of separating infant monkeys from their mothers at CU. His current studies investigate whether poor mothering leads to alcohol abuse in adolescent monkeys. In June, CU plans to send the monkeys to Wake Forest University in spite of activists’ requests to send the monkeys to a sanctuary instead. CU documents obtained by IDA indicate that Laudenslager will conduct his alcohol studies on the monkeys long-distance from the CU medical center in Denver.
In February, IDA urged that Wake Forest advocate instead for the monkeys’ transfer to a sanctuary and warned that protests and unwelcome media attention will result if the transfer of the monkeys, who have been used in the widely criticized research of psychologist Mark Laudenslager, proceeds. The ad marks the beginning of such protests.
Dr. Goodall comments in the 30-second spot, “It’s usually pretty hard for an ordinary person to get inside medical research facilities. They don’t want the general public really to know what’s going on. So much of this research isn’t leading to anything that could possibly be helpful,” and she concludes, “to allow such barbaric conditions to continue, is a very black mark against humanity.”
Laudenslager’s maternal separation experiments cost taxpayers at least $7 million, and the first year of his alcohol studies is funded with a nearly $800,000 federal grant from the National Institutes of Health. The experiments have been criticized by psychologists and other professionals as being irrelevant to human experience and a huge waste of tax dollars.
For more information please visit www.FreeTheCU34.org.