IDA Urges: "Smoke Out Animal Experiments" In Honor of Annual Event

San Rafael, Cal.—To commemorate the 33rd annual Great American Smokeout, In Defense of Animals (IDA) today is urging all sponsors and supporters of the Smokeout to oppose nicotine and tobacco experiments on animals.

"It's high time for tobacco-related animal experiments to go up in smoke," said Elliot M. Katz, DVM, IDA President. "Each year, an estimated $50 million in tax dollars are spent to force animals to inhale tobacco smoke and addict animals to nicotine. Meanwhile, the devastating health effects of tobacco smoke are well-known, and prevention-oriented programs are chronically under funded."

This week, IDA sent a letter to seven anti-tobacco and public health organizations, including the Foundation for a Smokefree America and The Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, asking the groups to join the effort to stop Department of Health and Human Services funding for animal tobacco research. IDA's "Up in Smoke" campaign, begun earlier this year, asks the federal agency to redirect funds instead into effective programs that have a proven track record of preventing and addressing human tobacco use.

Among the cruel and unnecessary experiments currently funded by the National Institutes of Health:

  • Forcing monkeys to inhale tobacco smoke
  • Force-feeding nicotine to pregnant mice
  • Giving electric shocks to mice who have been injected with nicotine
  • Fasting rats to train them to self-inject nicotine

Despite decades of study, these inhumane and costly animal experiments have provided contradictory and conflicting results and have failed to reliably replicate what we already know from human studies. For example, though it is widely recognized that smoking during pregnancy is linked to low birth weight in babies, animal studies have produced varying results. Animal experiments failed to demonstrate that exposure to cigarettes and tobacco smoke caused lung and other forms of cancer, which is now undisputed in humans.

"This is a gross misappropriation of precious government health care dollars, in addition to animals' lives," Katz continued. "The hundreds of millions of dollars that have been spent on cruel and wasteful animal experiments could have been used for prevention and cessation support programs and initiatives, such as smoke-free laws, outreach to school children, and direct aid to help smokers quit successfully."

For further information, visit www.UpinSmokeCampaign.org