PETA Urges Inspector General to Investigate Botched NIH-Funded Animal Experiments at Cleveland Clinic

For Immediate Release:
April 11, 2024

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

PETA is calling for an investigation by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Inspector General now that the federal agency charged with policing animal experimentation facilities has failed to adequately address a string of alarming violations of the Public Health Service Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (PHS Policy) in laboratories at Cleveland Clinic and repeated incidents of noncompliance at several other institutions funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

In a letter sent today, PETA lays out the case for an investigation by the HHS inspector general due to the failure of NIH, an agency under the HHS umbrella, to take meaningful action against the institutions that NIH’s Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare (OLAW) has failed to investigate properly.

“The failure of NIH to take action for critical violations of federal animal welfare policy is deeply concerning and allows institutions like Cleveland Clinic to continue endangering animals in laboratories with impunity and at taxpayers’ expense,” says PETA Vice President Shalin Gala. “PETA is calling on the inspector general to investigate these serious matters along with the disturbing pattern of cruelty to animals at various institutions and to take meaningful corrective action.”

Following an investigation by PETA into laboratories at Cleveland Clinic, the group filed a formal complaint with OLAW documenting various incidents of noncompliance with the PHS Policy, resulting in the compromised welfare of animals at the facility. These incidents included failing to euthanize paralyzed mice in a timely manner, likely prolonging their suffering, as well as neglecting to administer pain relief to mice with pelvic organ prolapse and handling them incompetently, resulting in their air supply being cut off. OLAW’s investigation involved merely accepting Cleveland Clinic’s standard operating procedures as sufficient and closing the case without taking any action.

Despite this, NIH has lavished Cleveland Clinic with $279,599,276 in federal taxpayer money since 2022.

OLAW has also failed in its oversight of several other institutions—including The Jackson Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University, the University of California–Los Angeles, the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and the Washington and Wisconsin national primate research centers—as outlined in PETA’s letter to the HHS Office of Inspector General.

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, Facebook, or Instagram.