Animal Defenders International (ADI) has revealed horrific treatment of monkeys at Biodia, a Mauritian monkey farm supplying U.S. laboratories and whose monkeys could soon be behind bars in a new Florida breeding farm. Days ago, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service revealed monkey imports have risen to nearly 20,000 (1). ADI is calling for the U.S. to stop the import of monkeys for experiments or breeding and join the international move away from monkey experiments.
Mauritius is the second largest monkey supplier to the U.S. with several farms, last year shipping 2,842 animals to the U.S. with Biodia responsible for 300-600 per year. ADI has revealed that Biodia’s U.S. trading partner Prelabs has plans to “establish the first Mauritius breeding colony in the U.S.” in Labelle, Florida.
Findings from Biodia include: Workers swinging screaming monkeys by their tails; distressed baby monkeys torn from the arms of their desperate mothers and tattooed without anesthetic; netted animals slammed onto concrete floors; animals killed and injured from fighting.
Brutal Monkey Farm Sending Animals to U.S. Laboratories
ADI President Jan Creamer said: “The poor U.S. regulations on primate experiments and imports are shameful, allowing unnecessary suffering, fear, pain and distress to intelligent and highly developed animals when alternatives already exist. U.S. primate imports also cause damage to wild populations and the wider environment. As other nations move away from primate research, the US remains in the scientific backwater, clinging to crude, outdated methods instead of advanced technology. This trade is cruel and unjustified.”
Monkeys are locked in tiny boxes & flown 10,000 miles to U.S. laboratories – some become sick and can even die (2). Air France & China Southern are the only passenger airlines to carry monkeys for laboratories.
Over 70,000 monkeys are used in cruel experiments in the U.S. each year (3). They are force-fed chemicals, injected with potentially poisonous substances and electrodes are implanted into their brains.
International regulatory bodies, scientists and governments around the world are moving away from monkey experiments and adopting the advanced alternatives which are available.
WHAT CAN YOU DO:
- Never ever buy a single thing for your household or beauty routine that isn’t CLEARLY labeled NO ANIMAL TESTING. Whenever you buy something as simple as a hand sanitizer, you could be directly contributing to this torture.
- Support groups (donate money, sign petitions, promote) like Animal Defenders International and Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine who have developed high tech computer replicas of the human body to knock out the cruel archaic usage of monkeys (who are not humans, ergo will not tell us definite results on humans via testing!)
NOTES:
1. U.S. primate import figures for 2013 (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2014)
2. “The IATA Live Animals Regulations allow macaques to be transported in crates that are too small for the long journeys currently endured, and animals have died as a result.” (Alternatives To Laboratory Animals, 2004)
3. Annual report animal usage 2010 (US Department of Agriculture, 2011)