End of use of live animals in training paramedics

I want to share some exciting news with you. This is from the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.

"Immediately after the Physicians Committee brought public attention to the use of live animals in a Houston-area paramedic training program, the institutions responsible announced an end to the practice. Officials at Baylor College of Medicine and the Montgomery County Hospital District (MCHD) stated that human-based training methods have replaced the use of pigs and they "do not have any live animal training planned in the future."

The announcement comes two months after Baylor defended the animal use and the same day that the Physicians Committee filed a federal complaint alleging that the practice was in violation of the Animal Welfare Act. Baylor was using live pigs to teach procedures to MCHD paramedics, but the recent decision to stop using animals means that none of the 47 paramedic programs in Texas uses live animals any longer.

In its announcement, MCHD cited its commitment to nonanimal training methods: "We believe it’s in the best interests of our patients and the community to provide our staff with the most up to date tools and methods of training..." The statement also pointed to the changing norms of medical education that eschew animal use.

To all of our Texas supporters who called and e-mailed Baylor and MCHD: Thank you so much for your help! Shortly after our members began placing their calls, Baylor contacted us to confirm the animal training labs would be ending.

Please join us in taking action to end live animal use in the University of Washington's (UW) paramedic program. It only takes a minute to e-mail UW leaders and urge them to replace the use of animals in the school's paramedic program with human-based methods.

With your help, we will modernize UW's program too!

Yours truly,

John J. Pippin, M.D., F.A.C.C.
Director of Academic Affairs