WHITE COAT WASTE PROJECT ends ALL primate testing and breeding at FDA’s monkey lab

In another stunning success the White Coat Waste Project (WCW) has achieved yet another victory in closing the FDA’s biggest monkey lab, the National Centre for Toxicological Research (NCTR), which ended all primate testing and breeding.

At the time of WCW’s campaign against this waste of American taxpayer dollars and animal cruelty, NCTR experimentation was at an all-time high with over 200 monkeys being abused annually. On their website WCW triumphantly proclaim – and rightly so – that, “Now it’s 0”.

They also state that no other group has shut down a government monkey lab or any primate testing in the USA in nearly a decade.

In 2016 WCW found that the NCTR in Arkansas was addicting baby monkeys to nicotine and the taxpayer bill for this unethical behaviour was $5.5 million. WCW began a campaign against it and in 2018 the FDA cancelled the tests and retired the surviving primates to a sanctuary.

Regrettably, hundreds of other monkeys were still being locked up and tortured by this agency. WCW intensify their campaign to expose more monetary waste and animal abuse by a government agency.

They successfully brought together Republicans and Democrats to enact legislation to end the abuse. They employed FOIA demands and lawsuits to reveal how baby monkeys were locked up alone in tiny cages for years and forcibly addicted to Ritalin, ketamine and amphetamine.

They unearthed horribly unethical activities such as newborns being torn from their traumatised mothers and slaughtered before they reached the age of one week.

Through an FOIA request, they obtained an email in which FDA white coats “literally congratulate each other for torturing and killing one of these babies”.

Also, under another FAOI request they revealed that FDA white coats patted themselves on their backs for abusing baby monkeys. They danced as they locked up the monkeys in cages – see below.

They obtained the assistance of Republican Brendan Boyle who said:

“Painful testing on primates has no place in the 21st century when superior alternatives are available, and I am thrilled that following my years of advocacy with the White Coat Waste Project, the FDA has finally shut down all its primate experiments at the National Center for Toxicological Research. I will continue to lead bipartisan efforts in Washington to stop the abuse of primates and other animals in outdated, expensive, and unnecessary government experiments.”

U.S. Representative Brendan Boyle (D-PA)

And the President and Founder of WCW said about their victory against US government funded animal abuse,

“We’re proud to have scored this victory in the war on waste by shutting down the FDA’s biggest primate lab. Since 2016, the White Coat Waste Project has been leading the grassroots and lobbying campaign to get the FDA’s National Center for Toxicological Research (NCTR) out of the monkey business where baby primates were locked alone in tiny cages, forcibly addicted to nicotine, amphetamines, and Ritalin, and newborns were torn from their traumatized mothers and killed before they’re a week old. When we first launched our investigation and campaign, NCTR’s primate experimentation was at its peak, with over 200 monkeys abused at the lab each year—now, it’s zero, and the FDA Commissioner’s office has stated that the program was retired, and NCTR reports that it’s switching to alternatives. A majority of Democrats and Republicans agree: taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to pay for cruel and wasteful government spending on primate tests, and we’ll continue to make sure they don’t have to and that NCTR doesn’t start monkeying around again. Stop the money. Stop the madness!”

Statement from Anthony Bellotti, President and Founder of government watchdog White Coat Waste Project

Success was finally achieved when last week, the FDA Commissioner’s office informed WCW that NCTR’s primate testing and breeding programme was “retired in December 2022”.