Untrained, Unqualified Staffer Blunder Leads to Ghastly Pig Death at UC-Irvine: PETA Statement

For Immediate Release:
January 18, 2024

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

Irvine, Calif. – Please see the following statement from PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo regarding two critical citations posted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture against the University of California–Irvine for separate violations of animal welfare regulations resulting in the death of a pig during cardiac surgery:

It’s difficult to know who is more incompetent: the University of California–Irvine staffer whose negligence led to the ghastly death of a pig or those who saw nothing wrong with an untrained and unqualified person assisting in surgery on an animal. PETA has filed a complaint with the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and urges the agency to suspend all funding to the school, which clearly doesn’t deserve one more penny from taxpayers.

The staffer failed to give a critical blood thinner to an anesthetized pig during cardiac surgery. The pig went into cardiac arrest and was euthanized. The staffer was not properly trained and was unqualified to work with live animals in the facility, according to a just-posted U.S. Department of Agriculture report.

UC-Irvine, which last year received more than $211 million in taxpayer money from NIH, must redirect its resources toward modern, non-animal research methods that will actually help humans, and we urge officials there to adopt PETA’s Research Modernization Deal.

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