Dave O'Connor: "Sad and heartbroken."

One of the most insidious accomplishments of the vivisection industry has been the corruption of science journalism. This happened because life science writing programs are housed at universities that benefit from having articles about their research published in mainstream media. Students have access to local scientists for interviews and practice their writing under the tutelage of accomplished writers who have already written favorably about the use of animals in research. The indoctrination is probably subtle, but the effects are seen everywhere one looks.

A recent example is NPR's report on David O'Connor's experimental infection of rhesus monkeys with the Zika virus, the disease de jure. The science writer seems to want her readers to have a good impression of O'Connor:

"O'Connor says that he can feel a moral need to do this kind of animal research and at the same time feel 'sad and heartbroken' at what the work entails. 'I don't think those two are mutually exclusive,' he says. And then she quotes him again: "I've come to the conclusion that there is an ethical and a moral imperative to study the most relevant animal model to get the most impactful and valuable data."

What a guy.

But O'Connor's lament and ethical justifications should be examined in light of his previous work rather than an appeal to a "public health emergency" during which, apparently, anything goes. That's pretty much the same excuse that was used to justify the torture at Abu Ghraib prison. In both cases, better, more useful information was and is available through less hideous means.

O'Connor says, according to NPR's science writer, that he feels "sad and heartbroken" about infecting monkeys with the Zika virus. He should have added that he feels that way all the way to bank. That would have been a little more honest. So far, in his Zika studies, O'Connor seems to have infected three young males and one pregnant female. At the same time, public health officials and medical doctors have been studying hundreds, maybe thousands of women and their babies. The history of medicine gives a good notion of which body of research is likely to provide benefit.

Looking at O'Connor's publishing history on PubMed, it appears that he has been using and killing monkeys since at least 1999; I suspect even he may not know how many monkeys he has infected and killed, but his career rests squarely on their corpses. Over the ensuing years he has made millions of dollars infecting and killing monkeys. This is his (partial) NIH grant history while at UW-Madison. They all use monkeys:

2009-2013: DEFINING THE IMPORTANCE OF CD8+ T CELL BREADTH IN SIV/HIV PROTECTIVE IMMUNITY. Total project funding amount: $3,241,340.

2011: NHP MHC GENE DISCOVERY AND TYPING TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT. Total Funding: $6,569,785.

2005-2013: IMMUNOGENETICS OF PRIMATES USED FOR BIOTERROR RESEARCH. Total project funding amount: $4,406,491.

2006-2007: SIV-SPECIFIC CD8+ T-CELL IN MAURITIAN CYNOMOLGUS MACAQUES. Total project funding amount: $507,040.

2008-2015: ADOPTIVE TRANSFER OF IMMUNITY ELICITED BY ATTENUATED HIV VACCINES. Total project funding amount: $5,433,316.

2009-2013 EXPLORING IN VITRO AND IN VIVO T CELL IMMUNITY TO SIV WITH MHC-IDENTICAL MACAQUES. Total project funding: $1,694,161.

2016: DEFINING SOUTH AMERICAN ZIKA VIRUS SUSCEPTIBILITY AND PATHOGENICITY IN ADULT AND NEONATAL NONHUMAN PRIMATES. $263,233. This project is a subproject of his 2015 grant GBV-C-MEDIATED PROTECTION FROM AIDS IN HUMANS AND GBV-C/SIV CO-INFECTED MACAQUES which received $665,879. Total funding for the grant in 2015 and 2016 was $929,112.

2014-2015: IDENTIFYING COMMON T CELL RESPONSES TO MAJOR PATHOGENS IN RHESUS MACAQUES. Total project funding: $1,354,157.

On top of that, he also receives $186,311 in salary from the university.

If you visit his lab's website, you'll see that he loves selfies. He does not appear to be someone wracked with sadness or suffering from a broken heart. No, he seems quite happy, giddy even at times, which makes sense given the fact that in his line of work, the only thing that matters is getting papers into journals -- no matter the actual low value of the information in the papers for the purported beneficiaries, taxpayers. Check out the videos on his website.

Postscript, after posting this, O'Connor got rid of the his selfies and and completely revamped his website.

Watch the video here.

O'Connor's A-Mazing Claims

At the July 8, 2010 meeting of the Dane County Board of Supervisor’s Executive Committee meeting (see: County panel's inaction puts monkey research plan in limbo. Cap Times), attendees were again entertained by the uninformed assertions of Dr. David O’Connor, a primate vivisector who studies Asian monkeys experimentally infected with an endemic disease of African monkeys, all the while claiming that he is studying a different disease (HIV) in an altogether different species (humans.)

This time he brought along a sidekick who was enamored with a certain claim made by O’Connor regarding a report that they both claimed to be slam-dunk proof that nothing positive or even different could possibly result from a county-sanctioned citizens’ committee looking into the ethics of experimenting on monkeys. (Resolution 35. See www.MonkeysInDane.info)

O’Connor went on at length about the absolute non-biased nature of the report. His sidekick (Thomas Friedrich, I believe), made the strange claim that he had never heard of the report, but then accused the resolution’s supporters in the audience of being uninformed. Apparently, this "proof" that primate experimentation is ethical had been unknown to either of them, but they felt everyone else should have known about it.

O’Connor and Friedrich should have done a little homework.

The report they referred to as the “Weatherall Report” is “The use of non-human primates in research: A working group report chaired by Sir David Weatherall FRS FmedSci.

You can read the report at your leisure here.

It is absolutely true that the report endorses experiments on monkeys. But it is far from true that the authors were not biased even if, as O’Connor repeated a couple of times, the authors do not themselves use monkeys.

One of the authors of the report is:

Professor Richard Morris FRS FRSE FMedSci
Professor of Neuroscience, University of Edinburgh
Neuroscience of learning and memory, neurodegenerative disease

I was shocked to discover that Richard Morris is the Morris of the infamous Morris Watermaze. You can visit his university webpage here.

Here’s his reminiscence about his famous invention: Long-term potentiation and memory. Morris RG. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2003.

In my opinion, someone who has made his living and has achieved some fame by damaging rodents’ brains and watching them swim around trying desperately to find a way to avoid drowning, is not a reasonable choice if one hopes to get a non-biased opinion on the ethics of experiments on animals, any animal – monkey, dog, or rat.

The absolute fact that two UW-Madison primate vivisectors either didn’t know what they were talking about, or were too lazy to actually give the matter any real thought or even cursory investigation, or else were simply posturing and perhaps even lying (though I doubt that either one of them took even a moment to look at anything other than the report’s conclusions), is yet more evidence that university representatives should never be believed when they say anything in regard to the use of animals.

But that's not all. O'Connor also claimed that the report was reviewed by another group of also unbiased experts, a sort of jury who looked at the original report, and apparently gave it their blessing.

One of the members of that group (view them here) was Professor Torsten Wiesel. Torsten Wiesel! (OK, like O'Connor, you don't know who he is; but O'Connor claims to be an expert in animal experimentation. And remember, he was absolutely clear that a citizens' panel would have to come to the same conclusions as the so-called Weatherall report.)

Torsten Wiesel shared the 1981 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with David H. Hubel. Among other things, they blinded kittens in one eye and experimented on their brains.

Here are a few quotes from "Early exploration of the visual cortex." Hubel DH, Wiesel TN. Neuron. 1998.

Monkey Optic Nerve and Cat Geniculate

We had the feeling of being in a rich orchard, with lots of fruit ready to pluck. We recorded from the monkey optic nerve, because no one had yet looked at the behaviour of ganglion cells in a primate.

Monkey Lateral Geniculate

One of the most satisfying studies in the 60s was the work we did in the monkey lateral geniculate body.... Had we had the sense and will-power we would have gone back to 17 and checked there, and it was not till 1968 that we finally discovered hypercomplex cells in area 17 of macaque monkey. This motivated us to revisit cat cortex, where we did indeed find them, though they were less common than in macaques.

Macaque Monkey Striate Cortex

On first recording from monkey striate cortex, some time in the early 60s, what surprised us most were not the differences between monkey and cat, but the similarities. We saw all the receptive field varieties that we had found in the cat (simple, complex, etc.), and only when we looked more closely did any species differences appear. With smaller fields and more precisely defined orientation selectivity, we had the impression of dealing with a Rolls Royce rather than a Volkswagen. We were certainly pleased at this result, since it suggested that our work probably applied also to humans, given that we are far closer to monkeys than monkeys are to cats.

And on and on ....

Prophylaxis for occupational exposure to HIV.

I read an article about two months ago on Channel3000, the web companion to WISC-TV, the CBS affiliate in Madison. I posted a link to the on-line video; I was flabbergasted, agog, bewildered, and amused by the bizarre "proof" held up by so-called HIV researcher David O'Connor that experiments on monkeys have saved humans lives.

I say so-called, because, as far as I know, his research is focused on SIV, the simian immunodeficiency virus, rather than HIV, the human immunodeficiency virus. In spite of this, and like essentially every scientist studying monkeys dying of this experimental infection, he still calls himself an HIV researcher. Check out his website: http://www.pathology.wisc.edu/Faculty/bio.aspx?name=doconnor

Anyway, here's the passage, cut and pasted:

Yet O'Connor argues non-human primate AIDS research has already saved lives. It wasn't that long ago when researchers felt they were on to something because a vaccine they'd tested was working. It wasn't until a wider test of younger and immunocompromised Macaques was done that it was discovered the attenuated vaccine actually transmitted HIV.

“So it was the work that was done in non-human primates that prevented us from making a potentially catastrophic mistake in advancing these sorts of attenuated vaccines, which have been used against a wide variety of other diseases into people,” he said.

Did you get that? Let me put it in terms that might be a little easier to understand.

Experiments on monkeys misled scientists into believing that a vaccine they developed would protect monkeys from SIV. Further testing showed that the vaccine didn't work and actually caused the monkeys to get SAIDS (the monkey version of AIDS).

O'Connor claims that this line of research saved human lives because they discovered (in the nick of time?) that they had been wrong all along and then didn't test the vaccine in humans.

Let me put it in even simpler terms: I invent a bullet proof vest and announce it is absolute protection from bullets. Then I discover that it doesn't work. Then I announce that my research has saved lives because no one wore the faulty vest.

If this pretzel logic is typical of O'Connor's thinking, then he should be fired, because he is unlikely to be thinking clearly about the biology of retrovirus resistance.

O'Connor addressed the Dane County Board's Health and Human Needs Committee about Resolution 35: "Establishing an Advisory Panel to Study the Treatment of Monkeys Used in Experiments in Dane County and the Ethics of Experimenting on Monkeys." Unsurprisingly, he argued that the County should not sanction any critical look at the use of monkeys. (See: County committee pushes for citizen panel to examine monkey research. Capital Times. June 30, 2010.)

During that meeting, one of the committee members asked him if they had found a cure for SIV, the monkey virus. O'Connor beat around the bush, hemmed and hawed, and was then asked again. What he said is akin to his claim above, complete nonsense.

He said that experiments on monkeys had led directly to the use of antivirals as a treatment for accidental exposure to HIV in healthcare workers. He said that experiments with SIV in monkeys had shown that treatment with antivirals could stop the establishment of an infection if the medications were received within two or three hours of exposure.

My ears perked up when he said this, because the monkey vivisectors are embarrassed by the paucity of easily demonstrable benefits resulting from their use of monkeys, and whenever they make an overt claim, it gives one something concrete to investigate.

In this case, it took me about a minute to find what appears to be an authoritative refutation of his claim.

I looked at this paper because it is available in its entirety for free. I found it on PubMed. It's from 1996: "Prophylaxis for occupational exposure to HIV." Consider these passages:

Health care providers who are parenterally exposed to human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) are at risk for infection. The average risk attributed to needle punctures and similar percutaneous injuries involving HIV is approximately 0.32% (95% CI, 0.18% to 0.46%), or 21 infections after 6498 exposures. This risk estimate, which is based on data taken from 25 prospective studies of occupational exposure, does not account for factors that may change the probability of transmission during a specific exposure. The virus inoculum (the volume of material involved in an exposure and the titer of infectious virus in that material) is one important determinant of risk. New data suggest that antiretroviral treatment after exposure may also be an important factor affecting the outcome of occupational exposure to HIV.

In a case–control study, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that five factors were independently associated with the risk for HIV infection after percutaneous injury...

Use of zidovudine soon after exposure, the final factor that predicted infection in the CDC study, was associated with a 79% reduction in the odds of HIV transmission (odds ratio, 0.21 [CI, 0.10 to 0.60]). This observation is the first epidemiologic evidence for a benefit from antiretroviral treatment among health care providers exposed to HIV, and it has stimulated renewed interest in prophylaxis after exposure.

The efficacy of antiretroviral prophylaxis is biologically plausible. Local host defenses appear to be critical in deciding the outcome of transcutaneous exposure...The process of initial virus uptake, antigen processing, and presentation to immune effector cells is not instantaneous and may take several hours or even days. Thus, a window of opportunity for intervention before local virus propagation or dissemination almost certainly exists. Early antiviral treatment may favor the host by minimizing the effective viral inoculum...

The results of experiments done in animal models to evaluate the efficacy of antiretroviral treatment after exposure are inconclusive. Zidovudine treatment after exposure can prevent retroviral infection in mice and cats, but data from these models are difficult to generalize to humans. Most studies of prophylaxis with licensed antiretroviral drugs in primates have not shown efficacy, although treatment with zidovudine before exposure was effective in one study of infant macaques that were inoculated with a low titer of simian immunodeficiency virus. The titer of virus used in most experiments involving primates is substantially higher than the amount that would be encountered in occupational exposure. In addition, the animals used in these experiments are usually inoculated intravenously, a method that would bypass potentially important cutaneous host defenses. Hence, absence of efficacy of prophylaxis in a primate model cannot be generalized to predict the outcome of percutaneous occupational exposure. Adverse consequences of treatment on the natural history of infection and delays in seroconversion have not been seen in animal experiments.

So what was O'Connor talking about when he said that experiments on monkeys are responsible for the use of antivirals to treat accidental exposure to HIV? Not reality, apparently.

O'Connor on HIV

Dane County Health & Human Needs on Research on Monkeys part 1 from luciano M on Vimeo.

[Breaking news: Breakthrough in HIV-fighting antibodies discovered. See bottom link.]

David O'Connor begins his comments to the Dane County Committee on Health and Human Needs at approximately 24:30 in the above video.

At about 25:19, he says:

However, the case of using nonhuman primates in AIDS research, which I do every day, is entirely different [than dissecting animals in anatomy classes] because its the cutting edge of science in the public interest.(1) Wanting to contribute to this effort is what motivated me to become an AIDS researcher 12 years ago and it continues to motivate me today. Simply put, the search for an AIDS vaccine relies on research with nonhuman primates.(2) Opposition to nonhuman primate research is therefore opposition to AIDS research, full stop.(3)

Don't just take my word for it. Here's what Dr. Anthony Fauci, who has directed the National Institutes of Health, the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984, wrote about HIV and nonhuman primates recently. Quote: The bar that a candidate HIV vaccine needs to pass will be raised on knowledge of prior clinical trials, nonhuman primate studies, and fundamental research.

Hum... OK, I won't take O'Connor's word for it.

Fauci didn't actually say this. The quote is from a report in Science with eleven authors, titled: HIV Vaccine Research: The Way Forward (Science 25 July 2008.) The report was published on the heals of yet another failed clinical trial of a vaccine that was developed using monkeys.

The MRKAd5 HIV-1 Gag/Pol/Nef candidate vaccine advanced to a phase 2b test-of-concept trial known as STEP, conducted by Merck & Co., Inc., and the HIV Vaccine Trials Network (HVTN). The vaccine neither prevented infection nor had an impact on early plasma virus levels in those who received the vaccine compared with the placebo recipients. In addition, a completely unexpected observation emerged in the STEP trial. Although a strict statistical analysis could not be performed because the data were analyzed in a post hoc manner, there was a trend toward a greater number of vaccine recipients infected, compared with the placebo recipients.

The report went on to say:

Although the vaccine in the STEP trial failed to show efficacy, the trial unequivocally demonstrated that the current simian-human immunodeficiency virus (SHIV) NHP challenge model is not appropriate for evaluating T cell vaccines; that the SIV NHP challenge model is more predictive ...

... After the disappointing results in the STEP study, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) held a scientific summit in March 2008 (21, 22) to solicit input on how best to reinvigorate and advance the field of HIV vaccine discovery research.

...The summit provided no clear consensus on whether a vaccine should demonstrate efficacy in a NHP model of AIDS as a criterion for entering clinical trials (the "gatekeeper" role).

... Given the extraordinary genetic diversity of HIV, the many features of the envelope glycoprotein that shield the virus from antibody-mediated neutralization, and the speed at which viral replication occurs and latency is established, design of a vaccine that blocks HIV infection will require enormous intellectual leaps beyond present day knowledge.

It's far from clear that the primate researchers are capable of such mental feats.

In fairness to O'Connor, the report does champion the continued use of monkeys in the study of HIV. But, as noted a gazillion times by every critic of this model, the experimental disease isn't HIV, and it doesn't cause disease in humans; using the SIV model is probably a dead end and has been demonstrably misleading as was demonstrated in the STEP trial mentioned above.

And the authors seem to have a strong vested bias toward the continued use of monkeys:

Anthony S. Fauci

Margaret I. Johnston

Carl W. Dieffenbach

Dennis R. Burton: uses monkeys

Scott M. Hammer

James A. Hoxie: uses monkeys

Malcolm Martin: uses monkeys

Julie Overbaugh: uses monkeys

David I. Watkins: uses monkeys

Adel Mahmoud

Warner C. Greene


1. Ahem. "The cutting edge of science in the public interest?" If this means something like "the most important question in medicine," then he's just wrong. While HIV/AIDS is the leading cause of death in the developing countries, it doesn't make the top ten in the developed world. This means then, that access to treatment and condoms is very important, and relative to people dying, access to treatment and condoms is clearly more important than finding a vaccine. Finding a vaccine might be impossible but prevention and treatment clearly aren't. If the "cutting edge" means the most important medical question, then very many other questions stand in front of an AIDS vaccine.

2. "AIDS vaccine relies on research with nonhuman primates." Gibberish. Monkeys don't get AIDS as a result of HIV infection. Anthony Fauci came much closer to the target when he said: "Finally, understanding how some HIV infected individuals, the so-called “elite controllers” who are able to keep the virus in check for years to decades may provide a different sort of “proof of concept”. Perhaps the best that we can achieve is the best that nature has already done. Although developing a vaccine capable of preventing infection is the ultimate goal, development of a vaccine that enables the recipient to control infection for years to decades would delay the need to initiate antiretroviral therapy and potentially even reduce secondary transmission to others." [Fauci: Why there is no AIDS vaccine: Scientists need a better grasp of HIV's interaction with the immune system. MSNBC. 2009.] An AIDS vaccine, if possible, will likely come from an understanding of HIV infection in humans.

3. "Opposition to nonhuman primate research is therefore opposition to AIDS research, full stop." You're either with us or you're against us, by gawd! When I read silliness like this, I can't help notice the stark contrast between O'Connor's (and other vivisectors') mental fogginess and the "enormous intellectual leaps" that will be needed in order to develop an HIV vaccine.

In fact: see this: Antibody Kills 91% of HIV Strains. Wall Street Journal. July 8, 2010.

Dane County Supervisors: Greetings

It has come to my attention that David O'Connor has written to you and expressed his concern that I have "personally attacked" those with whom I disagree (him), on this blog.

To a degree that is true. Although, in the case of Dr. O'Connor, I have criticized his assetions rather than him personally.

He has made a number of claims recently which I believe are illogical and are often demonstrably erroneous. I hope you will peruse my arguments and the evidence:

Prophylaxis for occupational exposure to HIV. July 2, 2010.

O'Connor on HIV. July 8, 2010.

O'Connor's A-Mazing Claims. July 10, 2010.

See too: PRIMATES USED FOR BIOTERROR RESEARCH

Thanks in advance,

Rick Bogle

P.S. I hope you follow up on the university's invitation to tour selected parts of the primate center. If you do, I hope you will ask to see some specific things:

1. One of Ei Terasawa's microdialysis procedures, and the monkeys she uses.
2. The monkeys used for the longest time in Michele Basso's experiments.
3. Monkeys in SIV studies who are exhibiting the worse symptoms of SAIDS.
4. One of Paul Kaufman's procedures and the monkeys currently being used in his invasive glaucoma research.
5. Monkeys currently being used in Maria Emborg's Parkinson's research.
6. All the singly caged monkeys.

Thanks again.

R

The Disease Du Jour: Polio, HIV, Ebola, the Zika Virus

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the vivisectors sucking from that public teat have a strong interest in the public's perception of their work. They have in-house public relations departments and hire public relations companies to convince the public that the horribly cruel things they do are not cruel and that the worthless and frequently misleading experiments they pay for with tax dollars aren't worthless and misleading.

PR in place of demonstrable benefit may have gotten its start in the formation of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis. David M. Oshinski explains in the introduction to his Pulitzer Prize winning Polio: An American Story:

In truth, polio was never the raging epidemic portrayed in the media, not even at its height in the 1940s and 1950s.... Polio's special status was due, in large part, to the efforts of a remarkable group, of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, which employed the latest techniques in advertising, fund raising, and motivational research to turn a horrific but relatively uncommon disease into the most feared affliction of its time.

The wildly successful fund-raising schemes of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis became the model for all subsequent disease-focused PR campaigns and the use of charities to fund raise around particular illnesses. It is all-in-all a very misleading business.

Universities and the NIH have capitalized on the public's easily activated fear -- a favorite tactic used by all manner of people with ill intent. While HIV/AIDS is a serious illness, the use of monkeys and chimpanzees infected with HIV, SIV, and/or SHIV contributed nothing to the treatment regimes and prevention methods recommended by doctors.

HIV was a gigantic financial windfall for all the larger primate labs and continues to be so even today after decades of failure.

Ebola, a recent money-maker and publicity-grabber, was briefly milked for every dime the vivisectors could wring out of it. And exactly like HIV, multiple proclamations of important breakthroughs were dutifully reported on by local newspapers and the misleading claims reported on far and wide by other gullible reporters with little knowledge or interest in the past claims that also failed to hold up in human trials.

The new kid on the block, but certainly not the last, is the Zika virus. On February 10, 2016, the University of Wisconsin announced that David O'Connor -- who had made his fortune [$27,408,246 in NIH grants since 2005] and contributed to the university's overflowing treasure chest by using monkeys in biodefense and HIV "research" -- had snagged an NIH deal to infect pregnant monkeys with the virus to see what would happen. And of course, the (University of) Wisconsin State Journal, dutifully published the university-written article under the name of one of its reporters the very next day.

O'Connor is quoted saying, "The more hyperbolic the media coverage is, the more it gets repeated, reposted, retweeted," ... "The key messages are that we don’t know a lot. We will know a lot 12 months from now. But it’s really important we let data guide the decision making, not our guts."

But then, only two days later, the World Health Organization reported that they would have real data from actual women within weeks. Indeed, like HIV, the monkey data will add little and will probably be wrong anyway.

These diseases of the day are windfalls for vivisectors and their universities. NIH is anxious to appear responsive and also wants good press. It is an altogether sick system. But sick people aren't the system's real concern.

Meanwhile, monkeys and other animals are poisoned, sickened, and otherwise tormented for no good reason other than money. That's what the university and all the rest have their eyes so clearly fixed on.

Continued Responsible Oversight - Part 3

A look at the NIH workshop "Continued Responsible Oversight of Research with Non-Human Primates"

Part 3. Some Interesting Bits and Pieces.

https://videocast.nih.gov/launch.asp?19835

The "workshop" was kicked off with a greeting from NIH Director Francis Collins. He is certainly in the running for making the most outlandish comment. He said, "Looking around the room, I am impressed to see the diversity of expertise presented here...". It's true that there were people sitting around the table who were doing different horrible things to monkeys, but calling them a "diverse group" was laughable. He continued with the joke that "we need lots of perspectives from the various views that are represented around this table...." But there were only two views; one represented by 28-ish vivisectors and their crew and the other by 2 outsiders. Jeez.

Then we heard from the main moderator, Carrie Wolinetz, Associate Director for Science Policy at NIH. One thing she said was particularly interesting to me. (Quotations are in capital letters because that is how they appear in the closed captioning file. The paragraphing is mine.)

Wolinetz: ... IT'S INTERESTING, HAVING READ SOME OF THE COMMENTS IN ADVANCE, TWO STRIKING THEMES THAT I THINK ARE RELATED TO THE STRUCTURE OF OUR WORKSHOP CAME TO ME. ONE, THERE WERE A LOT OF COMMENTS THAT SAID, WELL, YOU'RE TALKING TOO MUCH ABOUT THE SCIENCE, THEREFORE, THIS REALLY ISN'T A REVIEW OF THE ETHICS, AND THEN THERE WERE THOSE WHO SAID, YOU'VE GOT A SESSION ON ETHICS, THEREFORE, YOU'RE SOMEHOW COMPROMISING THE SCIENCE. AS IF THESE ARE TWO COUNTER VEILING FORCES, SCIENCE AND ETHICS, THAT ARE TOTALLY ANTAGONISTIC.

I THINK THAT IS SOMETHING THAT WE REJECT, THAT ETHICS AND SCIENCE REALLY GO HAND IN HAND, THE BEST SCIENCE IS INFORMED BY GOOD ETHICAL THINKING, AND AS WE THINK ABOUT PROTECTION OF ALL OF THE ORGANISMS USED IN RESEARCH, WHETHER IT'S HUMAN, ANIMALS, OR BACTERIA IN A PETRI DISH, CERTAINLY THAT IS INFORMED BY OUR BEST UNDERSTANDING OF THE SCIENCE OF THOSE SPECIES. THEY PROVIDE THE EVIDENCE BASE FOR MAKING SURE WE'VE GOT THE BEST WELFARE STANDARDS IN PLACE.

It isn't at all clear that ethics and science go hand-in-hand. The U.S. Declaration of Independence was a statement of an ethical position; the authors and signatories did not consult a biology text nor did they need to in order to proclaim that we are all equal. No amount of scientific benefit (that's code for any published paper) would be sufficient to tip the balance toward harmful experimentation on humans who do not consent, to breeding them, to keeping them in cages, or killing them to collect "needed" tissues. What science textbook should we consult to help us decide whether we should unleash more Josef Mengeles on unprotected populations?

The moderator for the first orchestrated section was UW-Madison primate vivisector David O'Connor who has recently cashed in on Zika. He has a track record of hitting NIH-paid jackpots. He currently has four funded projects together receiving over $3 million a year in NIH grants.

It is worth noting that the "workshop" lasted just over six and a half hours. The first part, moderated by O'Connor was a series of talks by vivisectors extolling their work and promising the world to those they imagined were tuning in, lasted for about 4 hours and 40 minutes. It concluded with a primate veterinarian promoting pro-vivisection trade groups and saying how supportive the Association of Primate Veterinarians is for the continued use of monkeys.

There was very limited discussion about ethics. Jeffrey Kahn makes a few comments at about 2:37:50, and continues briefly at about 2:41:36. Then, at about 5:10:00 into the program Tom Beauchamp spoke up. His entire comment is worth listening to, even if few others at the table understood him. He said, "... I CAN SEE FROM A NUMBER OF COMMENTS AROUND THE TABLE THIS MORNING THAT THERE'S STILL DEEPLY EMBEDDED [in] SOME FOLKS AROUND THE TABLE, THAT SCIENTIFIC NECESSITY IS THE KEY ISSUE. IF YOU CAN SHOW IT'S NECESSARY TO USE THE ANIMAL THEN IT'S JUSTIFIED TO DO THE RESEARCH. THAT'S JUST WRONG." A little later he gets into an interesting back-and-forth with Kathy L. Hudson, the Deputy Director for Science, Outreach and Policy at the National Institutes of Health, who says she thinks NIH is very open to change. She might have a career as a stand-up comic.

At about 5:15:00 into the meeting, the moderator of the section on oversight, Margaret (Mimi) Foster Riley asks how ACUCs assure that "ethical analysis" is represented on the ACUC? That's a crazy question from someone who ought to be well informed. (See my discussion Animal Research Ethics. 3/2012.)

Even crazier is the response from the top NIH watchdog, the Director of the misleadingly named Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare (OLAW), Patricia Brown (about 5:26:30): "SO FEDERAL AGENCIES THAT SUPPORT RESEARCH WITH ANIMALS, FORMED A WORKING GROUP IN THE LAST TWO YEARS AND HAVE PROVIDED JOINT FUNDING TO DEVELOP A NEW TRAINING PARADIGM USING ACTIVE LEARNING PEDAGOGY TO HELP DEVELOP IACUC TRAINING TO IMPROVE IACUCs SO THEY'RE THE HIGHEST FUNCTIONING IN TERMS OF ALL OF THE TOPICS THAT THEY ARE REQUIRED TO LOOK AT. NOT JUST FOCUSING ON THE ETHICS. BUT FOCUSING ON ALL THEIR RESPONSIBILITIES AS AN IACUC, BECAUSE IT GOES BEYOND JUST LOOKING AT IS IT ETHICAL TO USE THIS PARTICULAR MODEL OR THAT PARTICULAR MODEL."

One of the IACUCs at UW-Madison was chaired by an ethicist. He was hard pressed to point to an ethical evaluation of any proposed project that came before his committee. Pushed on the question he claimed that an ethical consideration perfuses the system, that it happens all along the way, from the initial application, to the NIH study section's deliberations, and throughout the ACUC's evaluation. But the minutes of his ACUC's discussions rarely included any record of such a consideration. The study sections certainly can't be relied upon because of members' clear biases. (See The "Best Science". November, 2009. See too: Animal Research Ethics. March, 2012.)

To her credit, Brown admits that the ACUC system hasn't been evaluated by NIH. But to the detriment of her credibility is the plain fact that OLAW could somewhat easily evaluate the ACUC system if or she cared to do so. USDA/APHIS inspection reports sometimes include citations for failures of ACUCs to meet the letter of the law. It would not be too difficult to quantify the reported ACUC violations and to sort them by type. The needed information is readily available to Brown; she simply doesn't look at it.

Jeffrey Kahn makes a few comments at about 2:37:50, and continues briefly at about 2:41:36. Then, at about 6:06:00, additional discussion with Kahn occurs, apparently because of on-line viewers questions, and runs more or less to the end of the session.

All in all, in the six-and-a-half hours, there were only a few minutes where the larger overarching questions were raised; the participants were primarily primate vivisectors and senior members of their federal support system. Peta has pointed out that in a workshop purportedly intended to address the ethics of using monkeys, a workshop filled with presentations about the claimed benefits of using monkeys, there was not a single presentation from an ethicist, a critic of any sort, nor from anyone who wasn't professionally or financially vested in the status quo. It is wildly far-fetched to imagine they might have had someone speak on behalf of the monkeys. In fact, in keeping with a common pattern, almost no monkeys were seen during the many hours of talks about using them. (See: "Forum" Keeps Details Hidden. October 2011. Particularly the observations by Susan Lederer.)

The general inability of the attendees to understand questions raised by Kahn and Beauchamp was the same sort of blindness or deafness that I have seen in other vivisectors. It appears to be a common characteristic. (One example, coincidentally also involving Jeffrey Kahn: Moral Similarities Continue to Confound Vivisectors. October, 2014.)

Vested Interests, Double-Talk, Ethical Blindness

Two Dane County Committees have listened to testimony and deliberated on County Resolution 35. One modified the original version and eliminated consideration of Covance’s annual use of about 7000 monkeys from the proposed citizens’ advisory panel’s purview, requiring the panel to consider only the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s use of monkeys. The second committee took no action at all, leaving the resolution alive but in parliamentary limbo.

At the first meeting, supporters outnumbered those opposed by about five to one. At the second meeting, supporters still outnumbered those opposed, but not as overwhelmingly. In both cases, the opposition was almost uniformly made up of UW animal researchers and staff.

At the first meeting, an HIV-positive man spoke in opposition, but he said that he knew UW primate vivisector David O’Connor, who’s confusion I have discussed previously. Another person who spoke, Peter C. Christianson, identified himself as a Dane County resident, but did not add that he is on the Board of Directors of the Wisconsin Alumni Association or that he is a full time paid lobbyist, or that he is employed by a law firm representing the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF). A friend of mine sitting next to him told me that he was playing solitaire on his phone throughout the meeting. Everyone else who spoke in opposition seemed to have a direct financial interest in animal experimentation.

At the second meeting, everyone who spoke in opposition had a direct financial interest in animal experimentation, and most of them had a direct financial interest in primate experimentation.

In the case of O’Connor, he erroneously claimed that a British study of primate experimentation was particularly important because it was completely unbiased, made up of people who, he erroneously claimed, didn’t have a vested interest in primate experimentation (unlike him and most of his colleagues urging the committee to kill the resolution.)

Also at the second meeting, we heard a new line from the university, laid out first by Martin T. Cadwallader. I think most people in attendance felt that he was saying that the public would now be allowed to tour the primate center. You can listen to him here (he starts talking at about 22:50). This is a transcript of his statement:

I’m Martin Cadwallader, and I’m the vice chancellor for research and the dean of the graduate school at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The university is not in favor of Resolution 35 as currently written. However, the university proposes to increase opportunities for citizens of Dane County and beyond to learn about our animal research program, raise issues, and engage in dialog.

To this end, we propose a series of forums that would involve research scientists, ethicists, veterinarians, and others engaged in, or interested in, animal research both on and off campus. The purpose would be to provide periodic opportunities to exchange ideas, become aware of the changing federal landscape in research, and provide an open forum on a broad range of animal research topics.

The issues might include: Who funds research of this kind? Are experiments involving animals necessary? Are there alternatives to using animals for research? Who is looking out for the animals? What happens when animals are no longer needed for research projects? What’s the value of research with animals?

In addition, we are committed to offering tours of our primate center, and we encourage you to take a careful look at our website on animal research which provides a great deal of information about the research underway at UW-Madison. It also provides information about our animal care and use program.

Our aim is to make our animal research program more transparent to interested citizens, and to provide valuable information on the concerns and interests of our community.

Following up on this was Deb Hartley, animal technician training coordinator. (Her comments start at approx. 75:05. Below is an excerpt starting at about 75:40)

.... I give lectures, training sessions, and actually tours. We have at the local level, many people coming in for tours. [I] orchestrate that. People that come across the United States from other facilities will come to learn from us our expertise and techniques, and also learn a couple other things about the monkeys. And also that reaches globally, we do international tours or international people and things like that as well.

I do encourage you participate in the tour. It doesn’t take a resolution or a citizens’ act to get into the facility. It is secure, but it is closed, or not closed, but it is secure because we want to protect our animals as well and our staff. I do encourage you to come on the tour, learn what we do....

(78:27) Like I said, anybody can come in. You have to be 18 and older, get your TB test done, bring your paper work, because we want to keep you safe as well. Come on in, and we’ll show you what we have, we are as transparent as possible [unclear] can be, and we’re proud of that.

So, Dean Cadwallader and Deb Hartley appear to have said that the public would be able to tour the primate center.

Cadwallader: “[W]e are committed to offering tours of our primate center.... our aim is to make our animal research program more transparent to interested citizens.”

Hartley: “[A]nybody can come in.”

After Hartley spoke, she was asked in the hall whether she meant what she had seemed to say about a tour, and she said absolutely. She said to email her and she would set it up. So, she was emailed the next day, July 9, but as of July 22, has not responded.

Follow-up inquiries about possible tours were met with stonewalling. All the people who could make a decision seemed to have quickly gone out of town. In a response to a separate inquiry, she sent this:

From: Deborah Hartley
Date: July 14, 2010 10:22:43 AM CDT
Subject: Re: Lab tour

Good Morning,

Due to several staff members out of the office until next week, we will address your questions upon their return.

Thank you for your patience,
Deb

Multiple follow-up inquiries about possible tours finally led to a clear, if mealy-mouthed, NO!

Either Vice Chancellor for Research and Graduate School Dean Cadwallader was blowing smoke, or else he has much less say in or control over what happens at the primate center than he believed. [Insider gossip factoid: Insiders claim that the primate center is essentially opaque to RARC oversight.] Either Hartley was lying about the opportunity for tours, or else, and more likely, her perception of the university’s secrecy and aversion to public view and consideration is warped and unconnected to reality.

The primate center is right to be alarmed about the possibility of the public getting to see inside or to critically evaluate their work.

A notable example of primate vivisectors mistaking the public's likely reaction to the realities of the lab environment might be Jane Goodall's and Roger Fouts's tour of SEMA:

In 1986, an underground animal rights group called True Friends broke into SEMA, Inc. [now BIOQUAL], an NIH-funded laboratory in Rockville, Maryland. Scientists there did AIDS research. They had close to 500 apes and monkeys in the laboratory. When True Friends broke in – apparently tipped off by an unhappy employee – they brought video cameras with them. In the classic manner of such break-ins, they were interested in publicizing laboratory conditions. For their purposes, SEMA was perfect.

The AIDS-infected animals were boxed up alone. That meant each in a metal cube, with one small window. These “isolettes” were 40 inches high, 31 inches deep, 26 inches wide. Inside the boxes, animals were rocking back and forth in the blind, ceaseless motion of the mentally ill, of children who are emotionally starved. The resulting videotape was released through people for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, among the largest and most aggressive animal advocacy groups in the country. PETA sent the tape to television stations and newspapers. One copy was also sent to Jane Goodall in England.

Goodall’s specialty was chimpanzees. But her long relationship with them made her feel – as Fouts did – responsible. She felt, also, an obligation to speak out on their behalf. She was already in contact with Roger Fouts, and after seeing the tape, she asked him to visit SEMA with her. They were escorted by a top-level NIH administrator. Fouts, who knew caged chimpanzees better than Goodall, was still shocked. “It was a nightmare in there. They had these chimps in metal boxes. One wasn’t even rocking anymore. She was just lying on the floor of her cage. When we walked in, the chimp lifted her head and looked up. It was like those children you see in Somalia, that blank look. They’re not there. And the vet said, ‘See, she’s not screaming,’ and he told the tech to take her out. ‘See, she’s just fine.’ They were holding her like she was a typewriter, and she was just lying there.

Afterward, driving away, Fouts remembers, the government officials began cheerfully remarking that they must be reassured by what they had seen. Clearly, the facility met NIH standards. Fouts and Goodall sat silently in the back of the car. He looked over at her. She was crying, tears dripping off her chin. The experience convinced Fouts that NIH was indifferent to the animals. ... (The Monkey Wars. Deborah Blum. Oxford. 1994. 23-24.)

Fear in place of thought

Listen carefully to O'Connor's argument for why he uses monkeys. He seems to argue that fear alone is sufficient reason to keep paying him. He seems to argue that any and every effort is justified to solve a serious problem -- and never mentions the complete failure of the method he is using. Critical thinking must not have been part of his alma mater's curriculum, or ethics.

Let's think for ourselves

[Posted by Rick Marolt]

Last summer, a resolution to create a Citizens Advisory Panel to study the ethics and treatment of monkeys in laboratories in Madison was introduced to the Dane County Board of Supervisors.  Self-interested researcher David O'Connor argued before the Executive Committee of the Board that the study was unnecessary because a working group in England had declared in 2006 that experimenting on monkeys was ethical.  After the Board voted not to withdraw the resolution from committee, effectively "killing" the resolution, the new director of the National Primate Research Center at UW-Madison, Jon Levine, said: "Those driving this resolution issue simply don’t like the conclusions drawn in previous discussions — that biomedical research involving the humane use of animal subjects is ethical."

These statements rest on two fallacies.  Or more.

To read the full post, please go to One Shared Planet.

Slow News Day at NIH

“NIH-funded mouse study sheds light on neural risks associated with prenatal alcohol exposure.”

“The team administered alcohol to pregnant mice at levels that resulted in peak blood alcohol concentrations approximately like those of people who either drink socially or who have severe alcohol use disorder. They then examined fetal brain cell response to alcohol and two other environmental stressors --hydrogen peroxide and methyl mercury—all known to induce oxidative stress...”.

PI/Project Leader: HASHIMOTO-TORII, KAZUE

ROLES OF PRIMARY CILIA IN THE DEVELOPING CORTEX EXPOSED TO ALCOHOL
Project Number: 1R21AA024882-01A1
Total Funding: $207,813.
Direct Costs: $118,750. Indirect Costs: $89,063

THE ROLES OF ALCOHOL-INDUCIBLE RNA-OPERONS IN THE FETAL BRAIN
Project Number: 1R01AA025215-01
Total Funding: $368,513.
Direct Costs: $210,579. Indirect Costs: $157,934

BIOMARKER FOR INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY IN CHILDREN PRENATALLY EXPOSED TO ALCOHOL [“The Hashimoto-Torii lab will perform the single-cell droplet digital PCR- based biomarker analyses (drop-PCR) with both human and mouse blood samples. The Torii lab will collect the mouse blood samples, perform comprehensive mouse behavior analyses, and statistically evaluate potential correlations between the animal behaviors and drop-PCR results.”] Project Number: 1UH2AA026106-01 Total Funding: $261,791.
Direct Costs: $157,340. Indirect Costs: $104,451

Meanwhile,

In 2007, it was reported that women who received 10- to 15-minutes of counseling from a nutritionist about the risks of drinking were 5 times more likely to report abstinence during their pregnancy. [O’Connor, Mary J., and Shannon E. Whaley. "Brief intervention for alcohol use by pregnant women." American journal of public health 97.2 (2007): 252-258.]

Vivisection in the Name of Genetics and Gene Therapy

Over the first nine days of July, 1997, I protested the use of monkeys at the Washington (then) Regional Primate Research Center by leafleting for 16 hours a day outside one of the main entrances to the building that houses it. ("The Warren G. Magnuson Health Sciences Building is part of the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington and the world's largest single university building with a total floor area of 533,000 square metres (5,740,000 sq ft). Although the building is made up of over 20 wings built over more than 50 years, the interior hallways are fully connected." Wikipedia).

While there with the Ape Army, I had the opportunity to visit with a number of passersby who stopped to talk with me about the issue. One of the people I talked with was a PhD student who talked to me about the impending completion of the first-ever sequencing of a multicellular organism's genome. Scientists published the Caenorhabditis elegans genome the following year.

The student believed that this event would mark the beginning of the end of the use of animals as models of human biology. He reasoned that knowing C. elegans's genome would lead to an immediate cascade of insights and a deep understanding of gene function that would be able to take full advantage of the human genome when it was eventually published.

These were not the wild imaginings of an overly excited doctoral student. His optimism was shared widely throughout mainstream science. Unfortunately, he was wrong.

As it turns out, the chemistry underlying the genome, of even the simplest organisms, is wildly complex and has yet to be understood.

Exactly how many genes make up the human genome remains a mystery, even though scientists announced the completion of the Human Genome Project a decade ago. The project to decipher the genetic blueprint of humans was supposed to reveal all of the protein-producing genes needed to build a human body.

“Not only do we not know what all the genes are, we don’t even know how many there are,” Steven Salzberg of the University of Maryland in College Park said October 11, [2011], during a keynote address at the Beyond the Genome conference, held in Boston. [More than a chicken, fewer than a grape. ScienceNews.]

In spite of the very limited understanding of gene function, vivisectors are richly rewarded with tax dollars to study the action of genes in animals. For instance:

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Macaque monkeys are the most important animal model for AIDS vaccine development and are increasingly being used in biodefense research. An individual's immunogenetics can profoundly influence susceptibility to AIDS viruses and other pathogens. Indian-origin rhesus macaques have the most thoroughly characterized immunogenetics; however, their availability for research is extremely limited. Chinese-origin rhesus macaques, cynomolgus macaques, and pig-tailed macaques are increasingly relied upon to alleviate the shortage of Indian- rhesus macaques. As studies with these macaques become more common, there is a newfound appreciation that they may offer compelling advantages over Indian-origin rhesus macaques for specific studies. To study cellular immunity to AIDS viruses and biodefense, a comprehensive understanding of major histocompatibility complex (MHC) and killer immunoglobulin receptor (KIR) genetics is required.... PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE (provided by applicant): Macaque monkeys are widely used in the development and testing of prophylactic vaccines against AIDS viruses and pathogens with biodefense potential. Major histocompatibility complex (MHC) and killer immunoglobuline receptor (KIR) genetics influence susceptibility to these diseases. We will sequence novel alleles and define their functional attributes in macaque populations used for infectious disease research. (From Title: IMMUNOGENETICS OF MACAQUES USED FOR BIODEFENSE AND AIDS RESEARCH Project Number: 8R24OD011048-08. O'CONNOR, DAVID H. Awardee Organization: UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON. Total Funding for 2012: $554,521)

The very complex chemistry underlying the functioning of genes is undoubtedly involved in many if not all biological phenomena. In spite of the massive public expenditures, research, and significant media hype regarding genes, genetics, the genome, gene therapy, epigenetics, etc. there still isn't a deep or firm understanding of exactly how they are involved. At best, our knowledge is cursory. The precise mechanism and control of the seemingly infinite details of biology remain largely a mystery.

This plain fact has far reaching ethical implications. The one most germane to the topic of using animals in harmful experiments is that idea that there isn't a good or even a logical reason to use animals as tools in research on genetics, the function of genes, or the mechanisms of gene-controlled or mediated biological function. Looking for gene-influenced effects on the biology of animal models of human disease and health isn't worthwhile without the requisite knowledge of the chemistry underlying all gene-influenced phenomena.

Because so little is understood about the functioning of genes, the choice to use mice, monkeys, or mole rats to study the way they function -- rather than using plants or fungi -- can't be supported by a rational argument that claims even a hint of ethical grounding or a concern for the animals being used.

A very large sum of tax-payers' dollars is made available annually to scientists who want to create and consume ever more mutant mice, but the money flowing from the public coffers doesn't justify hurting and killing animals.

Consider this explanation for why someone would harm animals in the name of genetic research:

Bipolar disorder (BPD) is a psychiatric disorder characterized by episodic mania and depression. It is a common mental health problem, with an estimated lifetime prevalence of approximately 1–5%. A meta-analysis of family, twin, and adoption studies found that relatives of BPD patients have a 10-fold higher risk of the disorder than those without relatives with BPD, demonstrating that BPD has a strong heritable constituent. Though ongoing efforts to elucidate the genetic basis of BPD using varied approaches have yielded promising results, a convincing molecular etiology of BPD remains elusive. There are at least a few good reasons for this difficulty in finding a genetic basis for BPD. First, BPD is a complex disorder at the molecular level, involving perturbations of not just single genes, but of systems of genes. Second, it may be more proper to speak of bipolar disorders in the plural; the pathology may have multiple heterogeneous molecular bases, a hypothesis consistent with the multiple heterogeneous findings in different genome-wide studies of BPD. Third, deriving mechanistic explanations of human psychiatric disorders using classical genetics presents difficulties due to practical constraints on experimental power and the possibility of epigenetic components of these disorders.

Because a convincing BPD molecular etiology poses significant technical and theoretical challenges to human geneticists, animal models for BPD have a strong potential to extend understanding of this disorder. (A new mouse model for mania shares genetic correlates with human bipolar disorder. Saul MC, Gessay GM, Gammie SC. PLoS One. 2012.)

Who hasn't heard of gene therapy? It'd be great if I could get an injection of some new genes that would replace the ones in the cells that comprise the fascia of my left hand (and now my right) and stop their over zealous production of collagen. But that isn't going to happen anytime soon. We just don't know enough about the mechanics of how the molecules that comprise DNA and RNA work to affect biological systems. We know they do -- somehow -- but the fundamentals and the details elude us.

For all the hype, gene therapy for any malady remains the stuff of science fiction. Or fictional science in the case of most labs using animals as genetic test beds.

The big news on the gene therapy front is that the European Union has for the first time (anywhere) approved the use of a gene therapy. Glybera was developed by Amsterdam-based uniQure for patients suffering from a very rare lipid-processing disease called lipoprotein lipase deficiency (LPLD). The condition apparently affects only one or two people in a million.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has not yet approved any human gene therapy product for sale.

In order to actually modify, re-engineer, or build new genes and gene networks that will have therapeutic value we will have to have a depth of understanding that is somewhere over the horizon.

The study of genetics or the genetics underpinning disease in humans does not requite the use of animals.

The real work in genetics and its promised ramification, gene therapy, is cell-based; the species of the organism from which the cells come is of no consequence given our current knowledge. If we understood genetics well enough, we could, theoretically, build essentially any kind of cell we wanted and could enhance any characteristic of interest. We could analyze an organism's genetic code, spot problems, and replace, eliminate, or even enhance any characteristic of interest.

Not only are animals unneeded, but their use in research that purports to be studying a specific disease or family of diseases thought to have a genetic component frequently entails the generation of so-called animal models of this or that human malady that are misleading and wasteful. This doesn't make good sense from a problem-solving or funding perspective.

Almost uniformly, induced conditions in animals are said to have some similarity to the human condition, but very few are anything more than somewhat similar. Perhaps as the result of this inappropriate tool-use, as it were, gene therapy hasn't proven to be helpful. The scientists conducting these experiments are hardly to blame -- other than for their cruelty -- for the lack of progress; they don't understand the real fundamentals of the very complex system they claim to be studying. No one does.

The fundamentals are likely to be the same for all gene-mediated life.

These fundamentals are as likely to be gleaned from studying plant cells as they will be from studying the biopsied cells of an animal with an induced or even a naturally occurring malady.

UW-Madison Urges Lawmakers to Gut Regulations

On April 26, 2017, Rebecca M. Blank, Chancellor of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, testified at the Hearing on “Duplication, Waste, and Fraud in Federal Programs,” before the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

She fed them a line of crap pandering to the Republican majority’s hell-bent desire to strip away all constraints on money-making. She made no mention of her institution’s duplication, waste, or fraud in federal programs, nor did she mention the university's many animal welfare violations, biosafety violations, or her institution’s repeated violation of the public trust. No, her message was clear: universities should not have to follow so many federal rules or be audited so much:

“We have spent many years adding layer upon layer of federal regulations, and we’re at a point where this is seriously impeding the productivity of our scientists.”

The underlining is in the original document. That was her main claim. But it isn’t because of the regularly violated regulations that the largest number of scientists at the university are not very productive. They aren’t productive because their major premises are dead wrong, though I am using productive differently than Blank. Universities use the word to mean the number of papers that someone gets published and the dollars they are able to bring in through successful grant applications. The actual result of the research, the measure of whether it leads to better healthcare, is not a factor in their calculations. It’s all financial bottom lines.

In the words of Blank, UW-Madison operates a “more-than a billion-dollar research enterprise.” Here’s a nice graphic from the university’s 2016-2017 Data Digest (I edited out previous years):

The largest slice of the funding pie comes from the Department of Health and Human Services, which is largely from the National Institutes of Health. In 2016, the university received $285,269,042 from NIH and $83,715,200 from NSF (about $370 million) according to the agencies’ webpages. The university’s 2015-2016 “Budget in Brief” reports that:

“The largest portion of the university’s budget, approximately $890 million, or 31 percent, is from the federal government. Most of this is competitively awarded to the UW for specific research projects and supports research time for faculty, staff, and students, as well as research facilities.”

Blank told the lawmakers that, "We can’t afford to sideline potentially life-saving research. And we know the system can work better, because we’ve seen it work better. Just consider the battle against the Zika virus:

... scientists at UW-Madison are leading the fight to control Zika. Several of them are posting their data publicly online in real time to quickly give others working to control the disease the best possible information. Because of the threat to public health, their initial proposal was given high priority and approved by the UW Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) and biosafety committees about a month after the researchers submitted their materials for approval. This was at a time when South America was seeing 20,000 new Zika infections every week, so even a one-month delay came at a significant cost, but this expedited process demonstrates what is possible with good communication and a common-sense approach....

She implied that the work the scientists conducted was in someway helpful in containing the epidemic or in treating the infected children. But it wasn't on either front. David O'Connor's lab which did report on a publicly-accessible webpage some of the results of their experimental Zika infections of rhesus monkeys. The rest of the story is that the lab's use of infant monkeys doesn't seem to have had very much to do with the response from doctors and health officials. The most important information emerged from epidemiology and clinical observation.

She went on to criticize the annual federal audits which she called excessive but admitted that they are conducted to be sure that institutions have "systems and procedures in place to provide proper stewardship of federal funds." She argued that because few problems are found, that the audits aren't needed. But the fear and worry that problems could be found is probably why they aren't. She of course didn't bring up the university's difficulty with keeping track of its money.

She told the lawmakers that the audits, conducted by Inspectors General were an overreach, but she did not mention the USDA's Office of Inspector General's repeated reports on oversight on animal use at institutions like the university which have been terribly damning and largely ignored.

She said:

Federal research grants come with many strings for a number of good reasons:
▪ To guard against improper spending of taxpayer dollars.
▪ To help to ensure research integrity.
▪ To increase access to research data and results.
▪ And most important of all, to help protect humans and animals involved in research.

We must operate from a shared set of ethical principles that guide scientific research. But the way in which these principles are translated into regulations by various federal agencies has created a system of unnecessary delays and expenses.

It would be awesome if she believed that protecting animals was at all important, if the university's culture reflected that, if it were the truth. But taxpayer dollars are wasted every time another animal is injected, cut into, poisoned, hurt, or killed at the university. If regulations protecting animals matter at all to the university, they would not have repeatedly broken state anti-cruelty laws by killing sheep through rapid atmospheric decompression or staging fights between mice, but they did and then slipped in a last minute amendment to the state budget exempting the university from the state laws protecting animals. Her claims were worse than just plain nonsense. On the matter of hurting animals she and a large number of citizens definitely don't share any ethical principles. Maybe the "we" was intended for the Committee Chairman, that man of the people, Ron Johnson R(WI).

PRIMATES USED FOR BIOTERROR RESEARCH

3R24RR021745-04S1
IMMUNOGENETICS OF PRIMATES USED FOR BIOTERROR RESEARCH
OCONNOR, DAVID H
$79,923

Dr. David O’Connor has stated that he opposes the creation of a citizens’ panel to consider the treatment of monkeys at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (or anywhere in Dane County) and the ethics of primate experimentation. During his testimonies -- he made public statements to the Dane County Health and Human Needs Committee and the Dane County Executive Committee in opposition to Resolution 35 -- he went on at length about the "necessity" of monkeys for AIDS research. (I have challenged a number of his statements.)

But he never brought up the fact that he uses monkeys -- and promotes the use of monkeys -- in bio-warfare research. He received almost $80,000 in stimulus funds to further his research in this area. Apparently, at least some small part of it was used to employ a newly graduated high school senior in his lab.

You can read more about his project on the NIH RePORTER website.

A less blunt description for the public as well as information about the way his grant "helped" in the economic "recovery" is available at Recovery.Gov: Track the Money.

Summertime Blues: 1000s Missed

I might as well wish they had wings, but I wish politicians worked on real problems rather than spending their time undermining the other party.

You may have learned by now that Senators Tom Coburn, M.D. and John McCain have issued a list of 100 projects funded by The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act that they claim are a waste of tax dollars.

The press release starts out this way:

(WASHINGTON, DC) - U.S. Senators Tom Coburn, M.D. (R-OK) and John McCain (R-AZ) today released a new oversight report: “Summertime Blues: 100 Stimulus Projects that Give Taxpayers the Blues.” The report, a third in a series, highlights questionable stimulus projects that are wasteful, mismanaged, and overall unsuccessful in creating jobs. The projects featured in the report cannot be considered as an investment in long-term priorities to create and sustain economic growth that the Stimulus was designed to do.

Kudos to them for doing so, but their motivation seems more political than anything else. Their goal seems to be an undermining of the democrats. If their motivations were genuinely focused on improving government decision-making and oversight, they could very easily have written a somewhat similar report anytime since they were originally elected.

The report doesn’t explain why they chose this infinitesimally tiny sliver of boondoggles to showcase. One hundred studies out of what must be hundreds of thousands of projects doesn’t really seem like much of a failure of oversight. I think they could have found many thousands more if they had taken the time to look or were a little better informed. If only they had looked a little more carefully at the National Institute’s of Health’s public welfare recipients, the research universities, they could have produced an encyclopedia of wasted tax money.

They did though call attention to five NIH studies, which I have listed below. These are copied and pasted here along with the associated references. In the original document, the links were not active, and I haven’t taken the time to fix them. But they are here if you choose to look them up.

20. Monkey and Chimpanzee Responses to Inequity (Atlanta, GA) - $677,462184
While much is known about how humans respond to inequity and injustice, researchers at Georgia State University are using almost $700,000 in stimulus funds to study why monkeys respond negatively to inequity and unfairness.185 “Seven species of primates will be asked to make decisions about whether or not to accept rewards in a series of studies in which their outcomes vary relative to their social partners.
The influence of social factors like group membership and individual factors like personality will also be investigated. The results of this research will clarify how decision-making is affected by unequal outcomes.”186 Previous research by the investigator on this project had found that “Chimpanzees respond with temper tantrums if they do not get what they desire,” and that “Capuchin monkeys and chimpanzees both respond negatively to distributional inequity.”187
184 Recovery.gov, Grants – Award Summary, “Georgia State University Research Foundation, Inc., Award No. 0847351,
http://www.recovery.gov/Transparency/RecipientReportedData/Pages/RecipientProjectSummary508.aspx?Award
IDSUR=43460&AwardType=Grants.
185 Website of the National Science Foundation, “CAREER: Understanding Responses to Inequitable Outcomes in Non-Human Primates,” Abstract Number #0847351,
http://nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0847351&WT.z_pims_id=5423.
186 Website of the National Science Foundation, “CAREER: Understanding Responses to Inequitable Outcomes in
Non-Human Primates,” Abstract Number #0847351,
http://nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0847351&WT.z_pims_id=5423.
187 Brosnan, Sarah F., “Nonhuman Species’ Reactions to Inequity and their
Implications for Fairness,” Social Justice Research, Vol. 19, No. 2, June 2006,
http://www2.gsu.edu/~wwwcbs/pdf/Brosnan%20SJR%202006.pdf, accessed July 21, 2010

[The entry for Project 28, below, has the accompanying picture of an apparently frightened chimpanzee associated with it. I suspect the actual authors don’t know the difference between apes and monkeys.]

28. Monkeys Get High for Science (Winston-Salem, NC) - $144,541
Researchers at Wake Forest University think that, in at least one case, it is good to monkey around with stimulus dollars. The Department of Health and Human Services has sent $144,541 to the Winston-Salem college to see how monkeys react under the influence of cocaine. The project, titled “Effect of Cocaine Self-Administration on Metabotropic Glutamate Systems,” would have the monkeys self-administer the drugs while researchers monitor and study their glutamate levels. 224 When asked how studying drug-crazed primates would improve the national economy, a Wake Forest University Medical School Spokesman said, “It's actually the continuation of a job that might not still be there if it hadn't been for the stimulus funding. And it’s a good job.” He added, “It’s also very worthwhile research.”225
224 Recovery.Gov, Grants – Award Summary, “Wake Forest University,” Award Number 1R03DA026590-01A1,
http://www.recovery.gov/Transparency/RecipientReportedData/pages/RecipientProjectSummary508.aspx?AwardI
dSur=8352&AwardType=Grants
225 Niolet, Benjamin, “Stimulus Funds Pay for Monkey Research in NC,” McClatchy, March 8, 2010,
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/03/08/89974/stimulus-funds-pay-for-monkey.html?storylink=addthis.

Project 69, like Project 93 just below it, is an example of using public funds to convince the public that using public funds for animal-based research is justified. In other words, propaganda. You are being taxed to pay for a program to convince journalists to write nice things about questionable research. Wake Forest University is particularly well known in certain circles for its addiction research with monkeys and rats. There are currently 29 ongoing publicly-funded projects on addiction in animals there, costing taxpayers about $10 million a year.

69. Addiction Studies Program for Journalists (Winston-Salem, NC) - $266,505
Wake Forest University is using $266,505 in stimulus funds to continue its annual science education workshops for reporters.444 “These workshops employ an interactive, problem-based format that engages the skills and knowledge of working journalists. Participants will have ample time to interact with program faculty — internationally known scientists, teachers of journalism, award-winning journalists from the print and broadcast media, and others who have made important contributions to the drug-abuse field.”445
444 Recovery.gov, Grants – Award Summary, “Wake Forest University,” Award Number 2R25DA01271811,
http://origins.recovery.gov/Transparency/RecipientReportedData/pages/RecipientProjectSummary508.aspx?Award
IdSur=20213&AwardType=Grants.
445 Website of the Addiction Studies Program, http://www.addictionstudies.org/inag-workshop.html, accessed July 25, 2010.

Project 93 should remove any doubt about the National Institutes of Health’s primary motivation.

93. NIH Spends Stimulus Money to Promote the Impact of Its Stimulus Projects (Silver Spring, MD) - $363,760546
When does a federal project cross the line from simple self-promotion into propaganda? Palladian Partners Inc. of Silver Spring, Maryland was awarded $363,760 to promote the good things being done with stimulus money by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).547 The project requires Palladian to develop “web-based real life stories that underscore job and infrastructure creation and accelerated ARRA research findings.”548 Indeed, interested citizens can go to the NIH Recovery Act website and learn about the $12.2 million stimulus grant NIH is spending on “Facebook for Scientists”549 and another story on how “Researchers Pull in Big Bucks Under Recovery Act.”550
546 Recovery.gov, Contracts – Award Summary, “Palladian Partners, Inc.,” Award Number HHSN263200700630PMod#5,
http://www.recovery.gov/Transparency/RecipientReportedData/pages/RecipientProjectSummary508.aspx?AwardI
dSur=21694&AwardType=Contracts.
547 USAspending.gov, all awards for Palladian Partners Inc.,
http://www.usaspending.gov/search?query=HHSN263200700630P&Search=Search, accessed July 24, 2010.
548 FedBizOpps.gov, “Development of Web-base real life stories,” Solicitation Number NIH1242467,
https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&tab=core&id=b2d36d38410e39065dbf2f1e34bd1f48&_cview=1.
549 Purdy, Michael, “Stimulus Grant Establishes ‘Facebook for Scientists,” November 4, 2009,
http://recovery.nih.gov/stories/facebookforscientists.php, Accessed July 20, 2010
550 Macron, Doug, “Rockefeller, OSU miRNA Researchers Pull in Big Bucks Under Recovery Act,” Website of the
National Institutes of Health, October 22, 2009, http://recovery.nih.gov/stories/rockefeller_osu_mirna.php.

95. A Better Way to Freeze Rat DNA (Columbia, MO) - $180,935
For many years, scientists have found laboratory rats to be good test subjects for studying human disease. One problem, however, is that once you deep-freeze rat sperm, it apparently becomes less useful when unfrozen. Solution: study the freezing process for rat sperm. Calling it an “urgent need,”558 scientists at the University of Missouri received stimulus funds “to develop freezing protocols for epididymal rat
sperm which would allow reconstitution of genetics by using standard artificial insemination and in-vitro fertilization methods.”559 The scientists note that “[o]ver the last few years, our laboratory has generated ample amount of data related with optimal sperm handling.”560
558 Stimuluswatch.org Website. http://stimuluswatch.org/2.0/awards/view/42256/rat-sperm-cryobanking-forgenetic-
resources, accessed July 17, 2010.
559 Stimuluswatch.org, http://stimuluswatch.org/2.0/awards/view/42256/rat-sperm-cryobaning-for-geneticresources, accessed July 17, 2010.
560 Recovery.gov, Grants – Award Summary, “University of Missouri System,” Award Number 1R21RR02591301,
http://www.recovery.gov/Transparency/RecipientReportedData/page/RecipientProjectSummary508.aspx?AwardIdSur=42256&AwardType=Grants.

This all got me to wondering about the total cost to taxpayers for the animal-based projects funded by the stimulus bill at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

It turns out that stimulus dollars went to 174 projects and that 81 of them, more or less (sometimes it is a little tricky to determine) were animal-based.

These projects generally amount to a waste of public dollars if the goal is the improvement in treating or preventing human diseases and other maladies. This claim is science-based. Claims to the contrary are faith-based or anecdotal.

The few published meta-analyses and systematic reviews of animal-based research’s contribution to improvements in human health care have uniformly reported that there is a wide disconnect between animal-based research findings and patient care. The reasons suggested for this have included poor research design, a failure to avoid bias, a lack of standardization between labs (something that is an accepted norm in human-based studies), and the inherent confounds associated with the biological differences between species. In the jargon of the industry, animal studies have a dismal translation rate.

See for example:

Where is the evidence that animal research benefits humans? Pound P, Ebrahim S, Sandercock P, Bracken MB, Roberts I; Reviewing Animal Trials Systematically (RATS) Group. BMJ. 2004.

Evolution and translation of research findings: from bench to where? Ioannidis JP. PLoS Clin Trials. 2006.

Survey of the quality of experimental design, statistical analysis and reporting of research using animals. Kilkenny C, Parsons N, Kadyszewski E, Festing MF, Cuthill IC, Fry D, Hutton J, Altman DG. PLoS One. 2009.

The fact that there are few similarly well-designed studies making contrary claims about the results of the animal-based research enterprise is suggestive. This absence of science-based proof that animal studies produce benefit is unlikely to be the result of no one trying to prove that the animal studies are productive. More likely, the people who have attempted to do so have been embarrassed into silence by their results.

A larger more insidious problem is that those receiving public funding to conduct the studies have zero interest in looking critically at their results. That is, there is a strong bias to maintain the status quo no matter how much pain and suffering the animals experience and no matter how little it helps humans. The house mortgage must be paid.

Below are the approximately 81 out of the 174 projects at UW-Madison funded by the stimulus bill. Given what we know about the unlikelihood of them doing any good, most could have been included in Coburn and McCain’s list.

3R01GM069420-05S1
MODULAR DESIGN OF SYNTHETIC TRANSCRIPTIONAL REGULATORS [in fruit flies]
ANSARI, ASEEM Z
$125,437

3R01DK066369-05S1
GENETIC MAPPING / BETA-CELL DECOMPOSITION IN TYPE 2 DIABETES [in mice]
ATTIE, ALAN D
$58,000

3R01DK066349-05S1
NEUROVASCULAR AND BEHAVORIAL RESPONSE TO CYSTITIS [in mice]
BJORLING, DALE E
$76,099

3R01DC004428-09S1
CHARACTERIZATION AND TREATMENT OF THE SCARRED VOCAL FOLD [in rats]
BLESS, DIANE M
$177,086

3R01AI066219-05S1
MATERNAL MICROCHIMERISM AND NEONATAL TOLERANCE [in mice]
BURLINGHAM, WILLIAM J
$10,092

3R01AI066219-05S2
MATERNAL MICROCHIMERISM AND NEONATAL TOLERANCE [in mice]
BURLINGHAM, WILLIAM J
$107,413

3R01DK056238-08S2
THE SHH-GLI PATHWAY REGULATES PROSTATE GROWTH [in mice]
BUSHMAN, WADE A.
$99,458

3R01DK056238-08S1
THE SHH-GLI PATHWAY REGULATES PROSTATE GROWTH [in mice]
BUSHMAN, WADE A.
$5,661

3P51RR000167-48S2
WISCONSIN NATIONAL PRIMATE RESEARCH CENTER SUPPORT
CADWALLADER, MARTIN
$921,484

3R01HL086939-03S1
VASCULAR COLLAGEN ACCUMULATION & MECHANICAL MECHANISMS IN PULMONARY HYPERTENSION [in mice]
CHESLER, NAOMI C
$22,643

5R21MH086014-02
[F-18]MEFWAY PET TO MEASURE 5-HT1A RECEPTORS IN GENE X ENVIRONMENT INTERACTIONS [in rhesus monkeys]
CHRISTIAN, BRADLEY
$218,870
“In this proposal, our goal is to use PET imaging of the serotonin system in the nonhuman primate model to study the effects of prenatal stress on the serotonin 5HT1A receptor. Particularly, to examine if carriers with a short variation of the gene for encoding the serotonin transporter are more profoundly affected by prenatal stress than those with long gene variation.”

3R01HD057064-01A2S1
GESTATIONAL STRESS AND IMPAIRED IRON HOMEOSTASIS IN THE YOUNG [rhesus monkey] INFANT
COE, CHRISTOPHER L.
$141,834
[Chris Coe has stated that he opposes the creation of a citizens’ panel to consider the treatment of monkeys at the university and the ethics of primate experimentation.]

3R01EY008768-17S1
MOLECULAR STUDIES OF RETINAL DEGENERATION IN DROSOPHILA [fruit flies]
COLLEY, NANSI J.
$210,692

5R21NS065352-02
A FORWARD GENETIC APPROACH TO STUDYING GLIOMA FORMATION AND THERAPY RESISTANCE [in mice]
COLLIER, LARA S
$207,388

1P30DC010754-01
P30 APPLICATION [to hire Michelle Ciucci to experiment on rats for the] "VOICE AND SWALLOW NEUROSCIENCE RESEARCH CORE"
CONNOR, NADINE PATTAKOS
$398,770

3R01DC008149-03S3
AGING, EXERCISE AND MECHANISMS OF ALTERED TONGUE FUNCTION [in rats]
CONNOR, NADINE PATTAKOS
$235,483

3R01DC008149-03S1
AGING, EXERCISE AND MECHANISMS OF ALTERED TONGUE FUNCTION [in rats]
CONNOR, NADINE PATTAKOS
$8,862

5R01HL095120-02
THE ROLE OF ZINC FINGER GENES IN LEUKEMOGENESIS [in mice]
DOVAT, SINISA
$367,370

5R01CA063677-16
ANALYSES OF PROGRESSION TO COLON CANCER IN A SPECTRUM OF PATHWAYS [in mice and rats]
DOVE, WILLIAM FRANKLIN
$367,370

3R01CA125591-03S1
THE PIRC RAT, A NEWLY GENERATED MODEL FOR FAMILIAL HUMAN COLON CANCER
DOVE, WILLIAM FRANKLIN
$31,025

3R01DK066600-05S1
BIOLOGICAL FUNCTION OF IRON RESPONSIVE ELEMENTS [in mice]
EISENSTEIN, RICHARD S.
$123,240

3R01DC001362-18S1
INTRACELLULAR CALCIUM IN HAIR CELLS [in gerbils, rats, and “birds”]
FETTIPLACE, ROBERT
$148,632

3U19AI070503-04S1
MECHANISMS OF RHINOVIRUS-INDUCED EXACERBATIONS OF ASTHMA [in humans and in mice]
GERN, JAMES E.
$603,162

5R01HD037120-07
UTERINE NK CELLS IN PRIMATE PREGNANCY
GOLOS, THADDEUS G
$591,326

3R21HD053925-02S1
A PRIMATE IN VITRO IMPLANTATION MODEL
GOLOS, THADDEUS G
$149,558
[Ted Golos has stated that he opposes the creation of a citizens’ panel to consider the treatment of monkeys at the university and the ethics of primate experimentation.]

5R01CA077494-12
WKY RAT GENETIC MODEL FOR BREAST CANCER SUSCEPTIBILITY
GOULD, MICHAEL N
$319,318

5R01HL077196-06
TITIN SPLICING MECHANISMS AND PHYSICAL IMPLICATIONS [for rats]
GREASER, MARION L
$363,06

3R01AR053815-12S1
PROCOLLAGEN C-PROTEINASE ENHANCERS: IN VIVO ROLES [in mice and zebra fish]
GREENSPAN, DANIEL S
$416,434

3R01GM076244-04S1
ROLE FOR ZIC GENES IN THE DEVELOPING MIDBRAIN [in zebra fish]
GRINBLAT, YEVGENYA
$136,466

5R21AI076707-02
FUNCTIONAL ANALYSIS OF HUMAN NKT CELLS AND MYELOID DCS WITHIN MURINE SCID [severe combined immunodeficient mice] HOSTS
GUMPERZ, JENNY E
$185,625

1RC1DK086831-01
METAGENETIC ANALYSIS OF MICROBIAL COMMUNITY BEHAVIOR [in the gut of the in the moth, the tobacco hornworm]
HANDELSMAN, JO E
$475,105

3R01GM058038-10S1
MECHANISMS OF JUNCTIONAL ACTIN RECRUITMENT IN C. ELEGANS [a small worm]
HARDIN, JEFFREY D
$50,240

3R21NS061150-01A2S1
VOLTAGE IMAGING WITH GENETICALLY ENCODED OPTICAL PROBES [in fresh living mouse brain tissue]
JACKSON, MEYER B.
$87,096

3P01HL088594-02S1
ROLE OF EOSINOPHILS IN AIRWAY INFLAMMATION AND REMODELING [in mice?]
JARJOUR, NIZAR N
$8,934
$8,934 [two matching amounts]

5R01EY018567-02
AQUEOUS HUMOR DYNAMICS STUDIES IN VIVO [using rhesus monkeys] AND IN VITRO
KAUFMAN, PAUL LEON
$371,073

3R21EY018370-01A2S1
EXTRA-LENTICULAR ASPECTS OF ACCOMMODATION AND PRESBYOPIA [in rhesus monkeys]
KAUFMAN, PAUL LEON
$389,400

R01AI069274-04S1
PANDEMIC POTENTIAL OF H5N1 INFLUENZA VIRUSES [in mice, ferrets, and monkeys]
KAWAOKA, YOSHIHIRO
$499,900

1R01AI077593-01A2
MOLECULAR PATHOGENESIS OF EBOLAVIRUS INFECTION [in monkeys]
KAWAOKA, YOSHIHIRO
$459,686

3R01HL068673-07S1
TGF-BETA IN INTIMAL HYPERPLASIA AFTER VASCULAR BYPASS [in rats]
$59,013

3R01HL068673-06S1
TGF-BETA IN INTIMAL HYPERPLASIA AFTER VASCULAR BYPASS [in rats]
KENT, K CRAIG
$59,946

3R21EY017970-02S1
NOVEL MITOCHONDRIAL TARGETED NEUROPROTECTANTS FOR GLAUCOMA [in rats?]
LEVIN, LEONARD A
$222,750

3R01DK071801-04S3
MASS SPECTROMETRIC STUDIES OF NEUROPEPTIDES IN FEEDING [crabs]
LI, LINGJUN
$26,000

3R01HL049210-10S1
ENDOTHELIUM-DERIVED VASODILATORS IN [sheep] PREGNANCY
MAGNESS, RONALD R
$9,478
and
$9,477

1RC2CA149023-01
NON-PEPTIDIC HIV VACCINE [testing in rhesus monkeys infected with SHIV]
MALKOVSKY, MIROSLAV
$500,000

5R01DA026067-02
PIN1 IN SYNAPTIC PLASTICITY AND TRANSLATION [in mice?]
MALTER, JAMES S
$371,250

3R01DK040428-21S1
CALCIUM REGULATION OF SECRETION IN NEUROENDOCRINE [rat?] CELLS
MARTIN, THOMAS F. J.
$37,900

3P01NS042803-07S1
ALEXANDER DISEASE [in mice]: CELLULAR AND MOLECULAR MECHANISMS
MESSING, ALBEE
$38,907

3P01NS042803-07S2
ALEXANDER DISEASE [in mice]: CELLULAR AND MOLECULAR MECHANISMS
MESSING, ALBEE
$88,917

5R01AG033493-02
TRANSTHYRETIN'S REGULATORY ROLE IN BETA-AMYLOID AGGREGATION AND TOXICITY [in mice]
MURPHY, REGINA M. et al.
$431,190

5R01HL093282-02
BIOMATERIALS FOR LOCAL REGULATION OF GROWTH FACTOR SIGNALING [in mice?]
MURPHY, WILLIAM L
$359,144

3R01DK042835-16S1
PARENTERAL NUTRITION: INTESTINAL METABOLISM/ADAPTATION [in rats and mice]
NEY, DENISE M
$99,844

3R01DK062388-08S2
ROLE OF STEAROYL-COA DESATURASE IN [mouse] METABOLISM
NTAMBI, JAMES M.
$91,570

3R24RR021745-04S1
IMMUNOGENETICS OF PRIMATES USED FOR BIOTERROR RESEARCH
OCONNOR, DAVID H
$79,923
[David O’Connor has stated that he opposes the creation of a citizens’ panel to consider the treatment of monkeys at the university and the ethics of primate experimentation.]

5R21DK078889-02
CHARACTERIZATION OF ENDODERM STEM CELLS DERIVED FROM MURINE [mouse] ESCS
ODORICO, JON S
$218,870

3R21HL089679-01A2S1
DIRECTED CELL FUSION FOR THE TREATMENT OF MYOCARDIAL INFARCTION [in mice]
OGLE, BRENDA M
$204,225

1RC1DK086410-01
QUANTITATIVE MITOCHONDRIAL PROTEOMICS OF HEALTHY AND DIABETIC MICE
PAGLIARINI, DAVID
$475,423

2R01AR045173-05
BONE CELL REGULATION OF THE VITAMIN D RECEPTOR GENE [in mice and humans]
PIKE, J. WESLEY
$360,338

3R01DK074993-03S2
MOLECULAR MECHANISMS OF RANKL ACTIVATION IN [mouse] OSTEOBLASTS
PIKE, J. WESLEY
$96,192

3R01DK074993-03S1
MOLECULAR MECHANISMS OF RANKL ACTIVATION IN [mouse] OSTEOBLASTS
PIKE, J. WESLEY
$617,681

3R01DC003693-06S1
MULTISENSORY PROCESSING IN THE BEHAVING PREPARATION [a euphemism for an animal surgically implanted with instruments or experimentally mutilated, in this case rhesus monkeys]
POPULIN, LUIS C
$140,521

3R01CA109462-04S1
ROLE OF AN RNA-BINDING PROTEIN IN [mouse] MAMMARY CARCINOGENESIS
ROSS, JEFFREY
$238,732

5R21DA027191-02
CHARACTERIZATION OF THE SIGMA-2 RECEPTOR [in rats]
RUOHO, ARNOLD EINO
$222,750

3R01DK080345-02S1
SYMPATHETIC REGULATION OF AMPK IN THE CONTROL OF NON-SHIVERING THERMOGENESIS [in mice]
SAUPE, KURT WILLIAM
$42,152

3R01AA010079-13S1
MODERATE LEVEL PRENATAL ALCOHOL EXPOSURE IN PRIMATES
SCHNEIDER, MARY L
$331,832

3P30HD003352-43S1
WISCONSIN CENTER ON MENTAL RETARDATION: CORE SUPPORT [including “rodent models”]
SELTZER, MARSHA MAILICK
$339,831

3P30HD003352-43S2
WISCONSIN CENTER ON MENTAL RETARDATION: CORE SUPPORT [including “rodent models”]
SELTZER, MARSHA MAILICK
$304,885

5R01EY018179-02
CYP1B1 AND RETINOPATHY OF PREMATURITY (in mice? and rats?)
SHEIBANI, NADER
$362,521

5R21DK082888-02
INVESTIGATING THE INTERPLAY BETWEEN WNT AND FGF SIGNALING IN PROSTATE INITIATION [in mice?]
SUN, XIN
$185,625

3R01AI059804-05S2
DIRECT REGULATION OF CD8 T CELLS BY INTERFERON GAMMA
SURESH, MARULASIDDAPPA
$12,429

3R01AI059804-05S1
DIRECT REGULATION OF CD8 T CELLS BY INTERFERON GAMMA [in mice]
SURESH, MARULASIDDAPPA
$8,862

3R01HD041590-09S1
GENETIC CONTROL OF MYELINATION BY EGR2 AND NAB PROTEINS [in mice? and rats?]
SVAREN, JOHN P
$8,862

3R01HD041590-08S1
GENETIC CONTROL OF MYELINATION BY EGR2 AND NAB PROTEINS [in mice? and rats?]
SVAREN, JOHN P
$8,862

5R21AI081120-02
ELEMENTAL IMAGING OF M. TUBERCULOSIS DURING INFECTION [in mice]
TALAAT, ADEL M
$181,745

3R01HD011355-26S1
HYPOTHALAMIC CONTROL OF PUBERTY [in rhesus monkeys]
TERASAWA GRILLEY, EI
$320,955

3R01HD011355-26S2
HYPOTHALAMIC CONTROL OF PUBERTY [in rhesus monkeys]
TERASAWA GRILLEY, EI
$41,283

3R01DC004336-11S1
ENGINEERING THE VOCAL FOLD EXTRACELLULAR MATRIX [in rabbits? rats? and dogs?]
THIBEAULT, SUSAN L
$321,877

3R01GM061753-09S1
NITOGEN REDUCTION AND XENOBIOTIC RESPONSE [in humans and guinea pigs]
TREPANIER, LAUREN A
$250,171

3R01HL086975-02S1
REAL-TIME MRI-GUIDED RF ABLATION OF CARDIAC TACHYARRHYTHMIAS [in pigs]
UNAL, ORHAN
$180,457

3R01CA112192-03S1
REAL-TIME ULTRASONIC MONITORING OF TUMOR ABLATION [in woodchucks, rabbits, and pigs]
VARGHESE, TOMY
$207,946

1R03NS067274-01
PPAR-GAMMA AS A THERAPEUTIC TARGET AFTER TBI [traumatic brain injury] [in mice]
VEMUGANTI, RAGHU
$74,250

3R03DC008884-03S1
PROTEOMIC PROFILING OF THE VOCAL FOLD EXTRACELLULAR MATRIX [in rats]
WELHAM, NATHAN
$37,125

3R01GM050942-13S1
FUNCTION OF 3'UTRS [in worm and frog cells?]
WICKENS, MARVIN P.
$473,266

3R21HD057684-01A2S1
NEUROENDOCRINE CONTROL OF PATERNAL CARE IN THE COMMON MARMOSET
ZIEGLER, TONI ELAINE
$11,189

3R01NS023808-20S1
MECHANISMS UNDERLYING RHYTHM GENERATION IN IDENTIFIED SPINAL INTERNEURONS IN MICE
ZISKIND-CONHAIM, LEA
$109,890

I'll let you add it all up.