After nearly a decade of living in peace, over 200 chimpanzees are slated by the federal government to return to biomedical research, where they may be housed in isolation and used in invasive experiments.
Tell Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius to stop the transfer of these chimps to research facilities and to instead retire them so they may live the rest of their lives in peace at a sanctuary.

Make direct contact:

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Avenue, S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20201
phone (877) 696-6775
online email form

learn more here

Support Washington State’s Anti-Tethering Legislation
Contact your State Representative, and ask them to support House Bill 2387
http://www.dogsdeservebetter.org/lawmap/wa.html
To read the entire bill click here

To find your state representative, click here

Protect Night Monkeys from Being Captured for Labs
Please write to the ambassadors of Colombia, Peru, and Brazil. Ask them to put pressure on local authorities to investigate the massive cross-border trade in night monkeys and protect their country’s night monkeys.
Contact:

E-mail the Ambassador of Peru to the U.S.
Find other Peruvian embassies here

E-mail the Ambassador of Brazil to the U.S.:
Find other Brazilian embassies here

For more information, click here

Horse Advocates Pull for Underdog in Roundups
It is horse versus helicopter here in the high desert.  On one side are nearly 40,000 horses spread over 10 states, whose presence on the range is a last vestige of the Old West. On the other is a group of crusty cowboys whose chosen method of roundup involves rotors more than wrangling, using high-tech helicopters to drive galloping mustangs into low-tech traps.

Egg industry alarmed about efforts to limit cage sizes
Egg producers are alarmed by efforts to ban small cages for hens, a movement that has gained momentum in an increasing number of states.   The 550 million eggs recalled in connection with the salmonella contamination came from hens housed in industrial-style “battery cages,” in which birds are crammed against one another in a long battery of wire enclosures.

Food safety groups slam USDA egg graders at farms in recall
U.S. Department of Agriculture staff regularly on site at two Iowa egg processors implicated in a national salmonella  outbreak were supposed to enforce rules against the presence of disease-spreading rodents and other vermin, federal regulations show.  USDA regulations say buildings and “outside premises” must be free of conditions that harbor vermin, but the agency takes a narrow view of its responsibilities.

Federal government files complaint against West Mich. dairy farm
The FDA is seeking a permanent injunction against Scenic View Dairy of Hamilton. The FDA says the farm sold cows to be slaughtered with illegal traces of antibiotics in their systems.  The Justice Department filed a complaint Tuesday in Grand Rapids Federal Court.

Stop Return of Chimps to Research

After nearly a decade of living in peace, over 200 chimpanzees are slated by the federal government to return to biomedical research, where they may be housed in isolation and used in invasive experiments.
Tell Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius to stop the transfer of these chimps to research facilities and to instead retire them so they may live the rest of their lives in peace at a sanctuary.

Make direct contact:

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Avenue, S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20201
phone (877) 696-6775
online email form

learn more here

Federal agents descend on egg farms at center of recall for second time
Federal agents have descended for a second time on Wright County Egg and Hillandale Farms, the two Iowa farms at the center of a salmonella outbreak and massive egg recall.

Filthy conditions found at egg producers
Federal investigators report seeing chickens and rodents crawling up massive manure piles and flies and maggots ‘too numerous to count’ at two Iowa poultry farms that have recalled 550 million eggs.

Egg recall not first problem for DeCoster operations
Austin “Jack” DeCoster’s business has faced civil rights lawsuits, environmental fines, child safety issues and egg bans over the years. Local governments reaped economic benefits from his farms.

Greece: Fur farms raided, 50,000 minks set loose
Police say break-ins at two fur farms have set more than 50,000 minks on the loose in northern Greece.
A statement from local police says the break-ins occurred Friday and Saturday near the city of Kastoria, which is the center of Greece’s fur industry.

Food Justice is an Animal Rights Issue
Food justice, in addition to being a compelling civil rights issue on its own terms, is an animal rights issue: we cannot promote a vegan, plant-based diet without simultaneously trying to remedy the structural injustices that make such a diet nearly impossible for large portions of the country.

Comcast Arena at Everett’s phone number:
425-322-2600
email contact form:

Urge Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to Retire the Alamogordo Chimpanzees
Tell Health and Human Services Secretary Sebelius to keep almost 200 chimpanzees at the Alamogordo Primate Facility (APF) in New Mexico and create a sanctuary there. Since 2001, chimpanzees have been housed at APF, where they cannot be used for research. However, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) plans to move the chimpanzees—many of them at least 30 years old—to the Southwest National Primate Research Facility in San Antonio, Texas, where they can be used in painful, invasive experiments.
* I am troubled that NIH wants to move almost 200 chimpanzees from Alamogordo Primate Facility on Holloman Air Force Base.
* Please ensure that the chimpanzees stay in Alamogordo.
* These highly intelligent animals should be retired and a sanctuary created for them.
* If these animals are moved almost 40 people who work at the facility will lose their jobs.

Contact:

Kathleen Sebelius
Secretary, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Avenue, S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20201
phone (877) 696-6775
web form email

As egg producers consolidate, problems of just one company can be far-reaching
The largest egg recall in U.S. history comes at a point of great consolidation in the egg industry, when a shrinking number of companies produce most of the eggs found on grocery shelves and a defect in one operation can jeopardize a significant segment of the marketplace.

Oregon animal-rights protesters acquitted
A judge has acquitted two Oregon animal-rights protesters ordered to stay 50 feet away from the owner of a downtown Portland fur store, despite a police officer’s testimony that they were 4 inches too close.  The Oregonian reported police and prosecutors alleged protesters Justin Kay and Jeffrey Wirth were about 49 feet, 8 inches away from fur merchant Horst Grimm when a restraining order said they must stay at least 50 feet away.

Ahead of circus in Everett, PETA protests at elementary school
The animal-rights group sent a protestor in an elephant costume and two other PETA representatives to stand near Lowell Elementary School. The group was trying to hand out coloring books to students and discuss how they believe circus elephants are beaten and jabbed with spiked bullhooks.
Animal Welfare Activists to Protest Bullfighting in Spain
“We want to benefit from this major success in Catalonia to extend this ban to the rest of the Spanish territory,” said José Ramón Mallén Vargas-Machuca, a coordinator of the Bilbao event and a representative from Fundación Equanimal, an animal welfare association. “But we’re not trying to get into any debate about identity and nationalism and any of the arguments that are now being used by politicians that have nothing to do with animal rights.”

OSHA fines SeaWorld for worker safety issues following orca trainer’s death
According to OSHA, it found three specific violations in SeaWorld’s conduct, most notably one it classified as a “willful” violation for “exposing [SeaWorld] employees to struck-by and drowning hazards when interacting with killer whales. The agency defines a willful violation as one committed with plain indifference to or intentional disregard for employee safety and health.