PHOTOS: Feds Fine Altasciences $5,000 After Slew of Animal Welfare Citations

For Immediate Release:
February 21, 2024

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) just slapped a $5,000 fine on Altasciences, a contract laboratory long on PETA’s radar, after staffers broke a monkey’s arm while restraining him and following a raft of other animal welfare violations. USDA fines are rare, even for egregious animal welfare violations.

Altasciences staffers also apparently ignored a veterinarian’s instructions and allowed an emaciated beagle to waste away and dropped a sedated monkey on the floor after tossing him into the air repeatedly, along with violating the federal Animal Welfare Act in other ways.

In November, PETA filed a complaint urging local law-enforcement officials to investigate and, if appropriate, charge Altasciences with cruelty to animals over several of the violations, which were released by the USDA before the fine was levied. PETA also urged the National Institutes of Health to withdraw its funding.

The violations don’t stop there. Staffers also gave four monkeys the wrong dose of a drug, then killed the animals because of the error. Federal inspectors found pigs whose hooves hadn’t been trimmed in so long that their toes had begun to turn inward and eight pig enclosures that were structurally unsafe.

“Altasciences rakes in nearly $300 million a year for its violence against animals in archaic and unreliable experiments, but it can’t manage to abide by even the minimal requirements of animal protection laws,” says PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo. “PETA is calling on Altasciences to clean up its act, get out of the animal-tormenting business, and adopt human-relevant research methods like those detailed in our Research Modernization Deal.”

Altasciences is a repeat offender. In 2022, the USDA cited the company for a slew of other animal welfare violations, including the following:

• Injecting dogs with a drug that was far more acidic than intended, causing them to cry out in pain
• Failing to report and seek veterinary care for four monkeys who had considerable hair loss, including one who had alopecia all over his body
• Having inadequate programs of veterinary care for dogs
• Confining a monkey to a cage that was far too small
• Inadequately cleaning monkey cages that had a buildup of brown and white material inside and outside the walls of the enclosures
• Not bothering to research procedures to reduce animal suffering before conducting painful and traumatizing experiments

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, or Instagram.