Both Alan Cooper & John Pippin, M.D. were felled by long struggles with debilitating illness It would be difficult to imagine two animal advocates with less in common than Alan Cooper and John Pippin, M.D., except that both were veterans of more than 20 years in animal advocacy on a variety of fronts, and died […]
Lab Dog: A Beagle & His Human Investigate, by Melanie D.G. Kaplan
Lab Dog: A Beagle & His Human Investigate the Surprising World of Animal Research by Melanie D.G. Kaplan Seal Press 352 pages $32.00 hardcover; $18.99 ebook. Order online: https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/melanie-d-g-kaplan/lab-dog/9781541604988/?lens=seal-press Reviewed by Merritt Clifton Perhaps the best way to start a review of Lab Dog: A Beagle & His Human Investigate the Surprising World of Animal […]
U. of Wisconsin & NIH muzzling hit by courts––& leads to org for lab techs
“Advocates for science without human or animal suffering” OAKLAND, California––“I’m overjoyed to share that we officially won the appeal in my free speech lawsuit against my alma mater, the University of Wisconsin-Madison!” animal advocate Madeline Krasno, 34, posted to multiple social media on August 5, 2025. Celebrating what appears to be a landmark win four […]
Four rescue transport pilots & two animal welfare scientists noted in passing
Matthew and Paul Berkovitz, 69 & 36; Seuk Kim, 49; Lee Krulisch, 80; Sheila Bolin, 65 Father and son volunteer animal rescue transport pilots Paul and Matthew Berkovitz, 69 and 36, of Westlake, California, and Thousand Oaks, California, respectively, volunteers for Pilots N Paws, were killed along with their dog Brody at about 2:10 p.m. […]
Why did the Houston Humane Society host a Halloween dissection lab?
Inviting tweens and teens to dissect snakes is not the same thing as inviting them to carve jackolanterns HOUSTON, Texas––“Learn about snakes with the Houston Humane Society,” social media ads aimed at “tweens” and teens from ages 10 to 18 opened in mid-October 2024. But these ads were not promoting a typical humane education […]
Marty Stephens, 68, chose footnotes over flamboyance in animal advocacy
Made anti-vivisection progress mostly quietly, behind the scenes Martin L. “Marty” Stephens, 68, who died at home in Clarksville, Maryland on February 17, 2024, after an 11-year battle with cancer, will be remembered as a footnote in animal advocacy history, or perhaps more precisely, as multiple footnotes in many reference works and research papers. […]
Sri Lanka animal advocates fight to stop corrupted “animal welfare” bill
Exempts anything done in the names of food production, science, & culture 22-year-old fracas over Depo Provera injections in street dogs lurks in the background COLOMBO, Sri Lanka––Sri Lanka may be the only nation in the world, and perhaps the only nation ever, in which almost every indigenous animal advocacy organization appears to be frantically, […]
Why the USDA cannot effectively enforce the Animal Welfare Act
The USDA Animal & Plant Health Inspection Service was designed to fail WASHINGTON D.C.–– Responsible for federal Animal Welfare Act enforcement, such as it is, the Animal & Plant Health Inspection Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture [USDA-APHIS] on May 20, 2022 got a public butt-kicking from National Geographic writer Rachel Fobar. The […]
Hurricane Maria: monkeys hold on, horses endure
“Oh my goodness, how could anything have survived this?” CAYO SANTIAGO, Puerto Rico––Hurricane Irma mostly missed the renowned Cayo Santiago rhesus macaque colony, on an island just east of the Puerto Rican mainland, but Hurricane Maria hit it head-on, at full Category 5 strength. The thousand-odd macaques on Cayo Santiago are ninth generation descendants from […]
Why is animal use in labs up, even as public moral approval is down?
Anti-vivisection organizations claim victory while running on old momentum WASHINGTON D.C.–– Fewer Americans than ever before––just 51%, barely more than half––believe biomedical research on animals is ethically acceptable, according to 2017 Gallup polling data. Paradoxically, total use of animals in experiments appears to have soared to an all-time high, according to research funded by People […]