Tag: Dogs

Sled Dog Action Coalition/PETA Unsuccessfully Try to Stop Appearance by Dog Sled Racer

In September The Sled Dog Action Coalition and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals led an e-mail and letter campaign to convince a women’s empowerment workshop in New York to drop an appearance by dog sled race DeeDee Jonrowe. Jonrowe is best known for holding the fastest women’s time in the Iditarod.

Yvonne Kopy, director of the Wild Women Unite conference held in Pulaski, New York, told the Associated Press that she received about 30 e-mails a day — some as far away as Europe — asking her to cancel Jonrowe’s scheduled appearance. Kopy told the Associated Press,

I’ve fought many battles, but I didn’t expect this one. The U.K., Italy, France, Scotland. That they really care who comes to Pulaski, New York, I had to laugh.

In an e-mail to the Associated Press, Margery Glickman of the Sled Dog Action Coalition said,

The Iditarod is animal abuse. And animal abuse is not motivational for women.

Similarly, PETA’s Amy Rhodes told the Associated Press,

Driving dogs into the ground and literally working them to death is certainly not a true sport.

Organizers went ahead with Jonrowe’s appearance and she led a parade through Pulaski.

Sources:

Protest targets dog sled racer. Associated Press, September 13, 2004.

Wild women unite in Pulaski. Edwin Acevedo, The Post-Standard (Syracuse, New York), September 18, 2004.

PETA to Send Dog Excrement to Iams

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals this week announced that it would send dog excrement to Iams to protest the pet food company’s continuing use of animal tests.

In a press release, PETA said,

Taking a page from the “flaming bags of dog poop” book of practical jokes, PETA members will clean up dog “business” at a local dog park and raise a stink about Iams abuse of dogs and cats by sending it to the pet-food maker in bags marked “IamsÂ’ Animal Tests Stink” as an unmistakable statement that the companyÂ’s cruel laboratory experiments stink

Just one question — how will Iams tell the difference between dog excrement and the normal crap that PETA sends it in letters, flyers and press releases?

Source:

‘Poop Bags’ Spoofing Iams Dog-Food Bags Marked ‘Iams’ Animal Tests Stink’. Press Release, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, August 27, 2004.

First Draft of Canine Genome Made Available

In July the National Humane Genome Research Institute announced that the first draft of the canine genome sequences has been finished and deposited in a number of free public databases for use by researchers around the world.

According to a NHGI press release,

The dog genome is similar in size to the genomes of humans and other mammals, containing approximately 2.5 billion DNA base pairs. Due to a long history of selective breeding, many types of dogs are prone to genetic diseases that are difficult to study in humans, such as cancer, heart disease, deafness, blindness and autoimmune disorders. In addition, the dog is an important model for the genetics of behavior and is used extensively in pharmaceutical research.

Researchers used DNA samples from 10 dog breeds, four wolves and a coyote to generate markers that will allow researchers to study genetic diseases in any breed of dog.

Source:

Dog genome assembled. Press Release, National Human Genome Research Institute, July 14, 2004.

University of Texas at Austin Disclaims Beagle Patent

Earlier this year, animal rights activists applauded the decision of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to reconsider a patent that the University of Texas at Austin obtained on a beagle disease model. In late May, the University of Texas at Austin formally gave up all of its rights to the beagle patent.

The University of Texas at Austin was awarded Patent # 6,444,872 for a fungal lung disease model applying to beagles and a number of other animals. The American Anti-Vivisection Society and a number of intellectual property groups asked the USPTO to overturn the patent on the grounds that the method of infecting the animals with the fungal lung disease were not novel or original.

On May 21, the USPTO agreed to reexamine the patent, and shortly thereafter UTA announced it would voluntarily give up its patent rather than defend the patent.

The motivations of the group concerned with patents makes sense, but the animal rights motivation seems a bit odd. AAVS president Sue Leary was quoted in a press release as saying,

It is fundamentally illegitimate and flawed to consider any animal to be patentable subject matter, and defined as a machine, an article of manufacture, or an inventor’s composition of matter. The horrible treatment of these patented dogs is a disgraceful illustration of the convergence of bad science and bad policy.

But, of course, the patent office wasn’t going to consider whether or not animals are patentable — that they are is already well established in the United States and the USPTO has issued more than 450 patents involving animals. All that was at issue here was whether or not the particular method used to infect the beagles with the fungal infection was novel or original.

Leary’s concern about the horrible treatment is even odder. If the method were patented, UTA and the private company it had licensed the patent to would have charged for the method and split the profits (at least for the term of the patent). With the patent rights disclaimed, anyone can use this method royalty free immediately.

So, in effect, Leary and her group fought to make it easier and cheaper for researchers to use this particular method.

Way to go, Sue!

Source:

Beagles win first round in fight for reprieve from patenting. Press Release, American Anti-Vivisection Society, May 21, 2004.

Groups object to UT’s beagle project. Associated Press, February 26, 2004.

Patent on beagle dogs cancelled. Press Release, American Anti-Vivisection Society, May 27, 2004.

Man Faces Life In Prison for Killing Dog

A California man could spend the rest of his life in jail after being convicted of killing and then decapitating his German shepherd.

James Abernathy, 42, was convicted of beating the dog with a golf club, shove a stake through its heart, and then decapitating the animal with a pair of pruning shears. Abernathy was apparently angry after arguing with his girlfriend and took out that anger on the dog.

Under California law, felony animal cruelty only carries a three year prison sentence, but Abernathy was previously convicted in 1986 of two counts of assault with a deadly weapon. That makes him eligible for life in prison under California’s three strikes law and the prosecutor in the case is asking the judge to impose that life sentence.

After his conviction, Abernathy’s lawyers argued that he was insane when he killed the dog, but a judge in the case agreed with prosecutors that it was anger rather than insanity that led Abernathy to kill the dog.

In 1996, the California Supreme Court upheld that state’s controversial three strikes law, but gave judges the discretion to strike or dismiss previous felony convictions.

Source:

Man could spend his life in prison for beheading killing his dog. Claire Luna, Los Angeles Times, June 5, 2004.

Judge finds convicted dog killer sane after hearing testimony. Associated Press, June 10, 2004.

Study of Genetic Differences Between Dog Breeds Will Aid in Mapping Genes that Cause Disease

Researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in May published the results of their genetic analysis of 85 breeds of dog.

In a press release announcing the findings, Fred Hutchinson researcher Elaine Ostrander said,

There are more than 400 breeds of dog, and each is an isolated breeding population. What this means is that each dog breed is like a little Iceland — an isolated breeding population that allows us to simplify a complicated genetic problem.

Although there may be just as many genes for a given disease in dogs as there are in humans, being able to search for them in a single breed allows us to find the one or two genes responsible for that disease in that population much more easily.

Based on the genetic analysis, the researchers sorted the various breeds into four groups of similar genetic varieties that presumably share common ancestors. Since most of the breeds are only a few centuries old, the differences in size and appearance are likely due to a very small number of genes. Since some of these breeds are far more susceptible than others to certain types of diseases, such as cancer, it is possible that researchers will only have to examine a relatively small number of genes to find markers for that apparent genetic predisposition to specific diseases. As Ostrander put it,

This study helps us understand the genetic relationships between the breeds, a finding that will facilitate our efforts to map disease genes and genes for what are known as complex traits, which result from the interaction of multiple genes. This analysis provides us with the blueprint.

Source:

Many scientists belive the dog genome holds information that will benefit human health. Press Release, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, May 20, 2004.