People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has approached not only the National Institutes of Health (NIH) with a petition, but also Florida Governor Ron DeSantis also asking him to help stop a planned research study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, which he claims involves animal cruelty.
The study, which aims to gather information on age-related cognitive decline, involves disrupting the sleep of elderly marmosets, which are small South American long-tailed monkeys.
“As governor of the state with the largest number of older Americans, [DeSantis] is in a unique position to condemn, before they begin, the 'aging' experiments in small marmosets,” PETA articulated in an email to Fox News Digital about its outreach.
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“PETA has obtained documents showing that [a research team] will wake up the monkeys every 15 minutes throughout the night by making loud noises,” the email continues.
In the letter to DeSantis, which was shown exclusively to Fox News Digital, Kathy Guillermo, senior vice president of PETA's Laboratory Research Department, described the study as “horrible.”
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) contacted the National Institutes of Health about a planned study to be conducted at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (above, left). The study will disrupt the sleep of elderly marmosets in an attempt to learn more about age-related cognitive decline. PETA also sent a letter to Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, hoping he could take over as governor of a state with “the largest number of older Americans.” (iStock)
“Preventing a monkey from sleeping (which is considered a form of torture in humans that can ultimately lead to death) will not mimic insomnia in people,” he wrote.
“This proposed experiment is so cruel that the university classifies it as what is called a 'Column E' study, meaning it causes distress and pain without any relief.”
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The study, funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), is led by Agnès Lacreuse, a professor at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and will be conducted at the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Amherst. Madison, according to records on the NIH website.
PETA sent this letter to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, asking him for help stopping a planned study that would take place at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He says the Sunshine State has more than 412,000 PETA members and supporters in Florida. (PETA)
PETA sent a second, more detailed letter to the NIH.
“The proposed experiments involve causing irreversible harm to non-human primates through experiments that offer little or no new scientific knowledge or human benefit,” states the letter, signed by Katherine V. Roe, Ph.D., a neuroscientist at PETA's Research Laboratory. . Department.
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Roe urged the NIH to “consider suspending funding for these extremely invasive experiments so that those resources can be directed toward research that could truly help our growing population.” aging population“.
The study, which aims to gather information on age-related cognitive decline, involves disrupting the sleep of elderly marmosets, which are small South American long-tailed monkeys. (iStock)
In a statement to Fox News Digital, PETA's Roe acknowledged that “improving the lives of America's aging population is of increasing importance and deserves serious attention from the scientific community.”
However, he also said: “It is appalling that the NIH is wasting taxpayer funds waking up marmosets night after night in experiments that are not only cruel and unnecessary, but have no chance of improving Human health“.
Roe suggested that “better studies can be and have been done with human volunteers.”
The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) corporate headquarters building in Norfolk, Virginia, in May 2023. (iStock)
“The NIH and the Wisconsin National Primate Center should be ashamed of themselves for subjecting these monkeys to maximum pain experiments under the guise of meaningful science,” he added.
The university defends the safety and importance of study
Michelle Ciucci, faculty director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Animal Program and professor of surgery, told Fox News Digital that researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Massachusetts-Amherst are collaborating on a study of Alzheimer disease.
“They are focusing on paper [that] “Lack of sleep plays a role in this debilitating disorder that often results in fatal complications,” he said.
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His goal, he said, is to develop a new way of studying Alzheimer's.
“To better understand and combat human diseases like Alzheimer's, researchers must turn to animals to mimic complex human biology,” Ciucci said.
“Nonhuman primates like marmosets share similar features of their biology with humans, particularly their brains, and offer opportunities to study the causes of Alzheimer's and possible treatments,” a researcher and faculty director told Fox News. Digital. (iStock)
“Non-human primates such as marmosets share similar features of their biology with humans (particularly their brains) and offer opportunities to study the causes of Alzheimer's and its possible treatments.”
In this NIH-funded pilot study, researchers plan to disrupt the sleep of adult marmosets, a primate species often used in brain studies, Ciucci said.
“To better understand and combat human diseases like Alzheimer's, researchers must turn to animals to mimic complex human biology.”
“Other scientists have discovered connections between sleep disorders and diseases such as dementia and Alzheimer's, but have not yet established bad sleep as a cause of these disorders,” he stated.
Over the course of the study, a small group of animals will be awakened several times over the course of a night, Ciucci said.
The study will be conducted at the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, according to NIH records. (iStock)
In later phases, they will wake up for three nights in a row.
“The animals, cared for by specially trained veterinarians in carefully managed conditions, will be awakened by sounds – short tones played at approximately the same volume as normal conversation or an alarm clock,” he said. “The sound will be loud enough to wake the animals but not scare them.”
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Researchers will track the animals' behavior, cognitive abilities and other “biological indicators” to determine whether sleep disruptions result in cognitive decline and biochemical changes similar to those seen in human Alzheimer's patients, the researcher told Fox News Digital.
As for why the study is classified as “Category E,” Ciucci said it's possible that sleep disruptions “may cause discomfort that cannot be addressed with typical methods such as medications.”
It would be “unethical and difficult” to use humans in a study to explore the role of sleep in the development of a disease like Alzheimer's, the researchers said. (iStock)
“Providing medications or other means of relief would interfere with the validity of the study and its interpretations,” he said.
It would be “unethical and difficult” to use humans in a study to explore the role of sleep in the development of a disease such as Alzheimer's, the researcher said.
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“Until scientists understand the causes and development of Alzheimer's in a way that will help them study more treatments in humans, the study of animal models of the disease remains necessary for researchers, patient advocacy organizations such as the Alzheimer's Association, the public, and experts from federal agencies, including the National Institutes of Health, who reviewed and funded the marmoset sleep study because they see it as promising and important public health” she added.
Fox News Digital has reached out to both Governor DeSantis' office and the NIH for additional comment.
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