By Harvey Rice, Houston Chronicle
GALVESTON – The disciplining of a researcher announced this week by the University of Texas Medical Branch is another setback for an institution plagued by repeated findings and accusations of failure to follow animal welfare guidelines.
A UTMB spokesman declined to release the name of the researcher, whose animal use privileges were suspended indefinitely for using mice in experiments in a manner that violated UTMB and federal guidelines, according to a statement released Monday.
UTMB also released a letter dated Dec. 1 informing the federal Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare that the researcher used pregnant animals without authorization, allowed unauthorized persons to experiment on the animals, infected animals with a viral agent without authorization and allowed animals to die during the experiment without euthanizing them to prevent painful deaths.
A spokesman said the problems were discovered during a routine internal audit.
The UTMB statement said the federal office was satisfied and would take no action.
“UTMB is vigilant in its efforts to ensure that all proper procedures, regulations and federal and state guidelines are followed and that research animals are treated as humanely as possible,” the statement said.
Michael Budkie, spokesman for animal rights group Stop Animal Exploitation Now!, a persistent critic of UTMB animal handling practices, called the UTMB statement about concern for animals, “Nothing more than a bold-faced lie.”
Budkie said animal-use privileges were not suspended for UTMB researchers involved in the treatment of guinea pigs that was the subject of a $33,000 fine in November.
Neither were the animal-use rights suspended for researchers who were found in a 2015 audit by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases to have improperly allowed monkeys to die painful deaths, Budkie said.
In December 2015 the former top UTMB veterinarian, Brian Gordon, filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Institutes of Health’s Office of Animal Laboratory Welfare alleging that UTMB officials intentionally covered up the deaths of animals in violation of the 1966 Animal Welfare Act.
The USDA has taken no action. Gordon, fired by UTMB in June 2013, sued for defamation and wrongful termination, claiming he was fired in retaliation for complaining about the failure of UTMB personnel to comply with its own standards and federal law governing the treatment of animals.
U.S. District Judge George Hanks Jr. dismissed the lawsuit Feb. 2, ruling that UTMB and Gordon’s boss, Toni D’Agostino, were protected by sovereign immunity because UTMB is a state institution.
D’Agostino was transferred in November and no longer oversees the animal welfare issues. A UTMB spokesman said her transfer to a different job was unrelated to the animal welfare problems that occurred under her authority.
In December SAEN! accused UTMB researchers of boiling four mice to death while cleaning their cages and of allowing two dozen to die without euthanizing them.