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The Taiwan government is close to stopping the torment of hamsters, mice, and rats in two cruel and pointless experiments conducted solely for marketing food and beverage products. PETA has already urged the Taiwan Food and Drug Administration (TFDA) to adopt these changes, but now we need your help to push the agency over the finish line to save animals' lives.
Taiwan's current, draconian rules suggest that experimenters torment and kill hamsters, mice, and rats in experiments purportedly designed to measure the effects of a food or ingredient on human blood glucose, insulin, and blood lipid (fat) levels. In the glucose test, experimenters repeatedly force-feed a test food to mice bred with diabetes, or rats injected with a drug to induce the disease, starve them, then force-feed or inject them with glucose. Experimenters then take their blood repeatedly.
The lipid test involves feeding hamsters a diet that induces high cholesterol, repeatedly force-feeding them a test food, starving them for at least 12 hours, and repeatedly taking their blood.
All the animals are killed at the end of both experiments, even though there is no need to do so, given that the blood sample is all that’s needed. But the agency has proposed important and compassionate new regulations that would require only human-based tests for these two experiments. The rule changes represent a major step forward for animals and an opportunity for Taiwan to be a leader in pursuing sound, human-relevant science.
The TFDA's positive move is the latest the agency has taken after years of PETA pressure to remove cruel experiments on animals from the country's health food testing rules, and our relentless advocacy for non-animal testing methods. Last year, pressure from PETA supporters like you scored a major win for animals when the TFDA removed animal testing as an option for companies attempting to establish dubious joint-protection health claims for marketing foods in Taiwan.
A public comment period is underway, ending July 5. You can help save the lives of thousands of animals by taking one simple action below.
What You Can Do
Please send a short, polite comment to the TFDA thanking them for proposing the new draft regulations and urging them to finalize them so no more animals die for blood sugar or blood lipid tests.
After you take action, you’ll see an easy way to share this information. Please ask five friends or relatives to support this campaign!