The Ohio State University Institutional Laboratory Animal Care and Use Committee
Click on the month to see highlights from the OSU ILACUC meetings. These pages will provide you with information concerning the types of research, species and the numbers of animals being used on the OSU campus.
In Their Own Words
Animal Research at OSU - A Nurses View
For the past few years I have attended the monthly ILACUC (Institutional Lab Animal Care and Use Committee) meetings at Ohio State University. The ILACUC committee reviews protocols submitted by researchers for experiments that use animals. The protocols are reviewed to be sure the number of animals being used is correct for the experiment being done and that "early removal" criteria are included in the experiment. "Early Removal" criteria refers to an animal being unable to stand, or unable to eat or drink. The animal is then removed from the experiment and killed. Protocols are approved for three years. Protocols can be renewed.All this sounds well and good. However, as time has passed, questions have arisen in my mind.
I started attending these meetings with only an Animal Rights point of view, but that viewpoint has somewhat shifted. I now wonder, "Is someone doing this experiment just to get grant money? Have they really and truly looked for alternatives to using animals? How many years can a researcher keep doing basically the same experiment and not show any results? Is my tax dollar actually helping to inflict unrelieved pain on another living being? Could the money spent on certain research projects have instead been used to help people in our society live healthier lives?
Where is the emphasis on prevention?", and basically, on some protocols, one has to ask,"Who would care?" As George Bernard Shaw stated, "Vivisection is a social evil because if it advances human knowledge, it does so at the expense of human character..."
How many guinea pigs have to suffer to help study wound healing in people who smoke and drink? How many horses have to die in experiments to help the race horse industry have horses that can run faster? How many dogs have to have heart attacks induced or be put into cardiac failure so one more medicine can be put on the market to help people who want to eat fast food and never get off the couch? How many cats will have to be put through the trauma of being an "animal model" for someone with AIDS? How many mice have to be put through "E" experiments (unrelieved pain), because they are "only" rodents?
I find solace in the fact that the Animal Rights movement is only in its infancy. Hopefully, researchers who are entirely caught up in "The System" and do things a certain way because "it's the way we've always done it" will be replaced by a more compassionate breed, and the animal kingdom will be better off for it. I also find comfort in the fact that there would not even be a Lab Animal Care and Use Committee meeting to attend if activists years ago had not kept hammering away to attain it. And so, I hammer away....
Linda Orenchuk, Registered Nurse and Animal Activist