For years, PCRM worked to end the use of live pigs in medical student training at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. But we just learned that the school has replaced its use of animals! Your calls and e-mails to the school helped make this victory happen.
We now need your help to end animal use at Wisconsin’s other medical school—the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW). Please ask MCW dean and executive vice president Jonathan Ravdin, M.D., to replace the school’s use of rabbits, frogs, and rats.
One of the last holdouts among United States medical schools, the University of Wisconsin (UW) now joins the overwhelming majority of institutions that no longer use live animals to teach future physicians. During the first year physiology course at UW, medical students used to participate in laboratory sessions during which procedures were practiced on live pigs before the animals were bled out and killed.
Earlier this year, MCW also eliminated its pig lab, but MCW is still using live frogs, rats, and rabbits. Please e-mail Dr. Ravdin and ask him to end this animal use too. Ninety-five percent of U.S. medical schools have already ended their live animal laboratories. With your help MCW will be the next school to completely replace animal use in its curriculum.
Thank you for all of your help.
Best regards,
John J. Pippin, M.D., F.A.C.C.
Senior Medical and Research Adviser