PETA urges Old Dominion University to rethink tick research

NORFOLK

Old Dominion University is defending itself against allegations from animal-welfare activists that rabbits are being mistreated in laboratory experiments at the school.

In a letter to ODU President John Broderick on Monday, the Norfolk-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals urged that the research be stopped, suggesting that the university might be violating federal animal welfare laws.

The rabbits are used as hosts for breeding ticks. The research is aimed at finding ways to genetically alter disease-carrying ticks so they can't breed in the wild.

The research is the work of Daniel Sonenshine, a retired ODU biology professor and internationally known tick expert. Sonenshine is a director of a company that until recently conducted similar research at a private lab in rural Gates County, N.C.

That lab halted its work last month and surrendered more than 200 animals after an undercover investigation by PETA. A U.S. Department of Agriculture inspection, conducted in response to a complaint from PETA, found widespread safety hazards and dozens of sick and injured animals there.

Sonenshine's wife, Helen, president of the company that runs the lab, disputed PETA's allegations and said federal inspectors found no evidence of abuse or neglect.

As described by PETA, the tick-breeding research involves shaving the backs of rabbits and attaching a plastic capsule filled with ticks, allowing the ticks to feed on the rabbits and become engorged with blood.

The procedure is painful to the rabbits and may constitute a violation of the federal Animal Welfare Act, Kathy Guillermo, vice president for laboratory investigations at PETA, wrote in her letter to Broderick.

Alternative methods for breeding ticks, not involving the use of live animals, have been available for at least 14 years, she wrote.

In a response Wednesday, ODU Provost Carol Simpson and Mohammad Karim, vice president for research, wrote that the tick-breeding method used at ODU is the same as that used at many other research institutions around the country.

They said ODU researchers have tried to replicate alternative methods pioneered by European researchers but found them inadequate to maintain a healthy colony of disease-carrying North American ticks.

Moreover, they wrote, the six rabbits in the ODU lab lose less than 1.5 percent of their total blood volume per day, the ticks are disease-free, and the rabbits show no evidence of pain or distress while the ticks are attached.

ODU's research protocol has never been questioned by federal inspectors and "we have never received any indication that the protocol used is in any way contrary to either the spirit or the letter of the federal law," they wrote.

Guillermo said Wednesday that PETA will provide ODU detailed information about alternative tick-breeding methods. "It's disgusting that they're unwilling even to entertain the idea of implementing the non animal methods," she said.

Bill Sizemore, (757) 446-2276, bill.sizemore@pilotonline.com