More than thirty facilities in Virginia experiment using animals – among them seven state universities. The Norfolk-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals or PETA says that over a ten-year period, the University of Virginia was cited more than 50 times by regulators from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Most recently, an inspector said scientists failed to administer pain medication to rabbits undergoing surgery and held 40 sparrows in an unsafe outdoor cage.
“A recently posted inspection report documented what’s called a critical violation, which is the worst violation. Likely a predator was able to access and kill the sparrows.”
Alka Chandna is vice president of lab investigations at PETA. Her group sent a freedom of information act request to UVA – hoping to understand what happened. More than three months and $239 later it received 25 heavily redacted pages from the university providing few additional details.
“Transparency is not the strong suit of either the university or of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.”
We asked UVA to discuss these citations. The school wrote back to say it takes the well-being of all animals in its care to heart, and the sparrow incident was not a failure in housing, but rather an unforeseen event.
In an appeal to the USDA, it compared the invasion by a predator to storm damage, noting even the best engineering can fail in extreme, unpredictable situations.
