OHSU Board Shake-Up Prompts PETA’s Plea to Governor: End Deadly OB/GYN Drills on Live Pigs

For Immediate Release:
September 13, 2024

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

PETA is urging Gov. Tina Kotek to appoint a new Oregon Health & Science University Board of Directors chair who will end the cruel use of live pigs as stand-ins for women in the school’s obstetrics and gynecology (OB/GYN) physician residency training program. The group’s letter, sent today, comes as the current controversial board chair approaches the end of his tenure.

PETA also sent a letter to Mayor Ted Wheeler—who has touted Portland’s reputation as an animal-friendly city—calling on him to urge the school to adopt a public policy prohibiting the use of live animals in its OB/GYN physician residency training program.

PETA has obtained records showing that at least 64 OB/GYN residents at the university have sliced open dozens of live female pigs in invasive practice surgeries, dissected their organs, and killed any survivors in attempts to learn human medicine. PETA also obtained internal e-mails revealing that doctors and a trainee at the university have expressed concerns about using live pigs in surgical training. Yet the school continues to require the mutilations, wasting more than $13,000 to purchase and kill 14 female pigs between March 2022 and April 2023.

“Instead of providing doctors in training with a high-quality education, Oregon Health & Science University forces them to mutilate live pigs in grisly procedures that leading institutions have prohibited,” says PETA Vice President Shalin Gala. “PETA urges Gov. Kotek to appoint a chair committed to modernizing the university’s OB/GYN training with superior, animal-free methods.”

More than 100 accredited OB/GYN residency programs have confirmed that they don’t use live animals in physician training. Programs at Aurora Sinai Medical Center, Rush University Medical Center, and the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center ended their use of live pigs in favor of animal-free simulation technology after hearing from PETA. Henry Ford Hospital adopted a public policy against this practice after discussions with the group.

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.