Political Quotes

“I rise today to introduce legislation to end the use of Great Apes in invasive research and urge my Senate colleagues to support the Great Ape Protection and Cost Savings Act. The Great Ape Protection and Cost Savings Act would prohibit invasive research on all Great Apes, including gorillas, orangutans, and chimpanzees--who are the primary Great Apes used in research today. The bill would also require the immediate retirement of 500 federally-owned chimpanzees to great ape sanctuaries. Today about 1,000 chimpanzees--half of them federally owned--languish at great taxpayer expense in eight research laboratories across the Nation. These chimpanzees are being held or used for invasive biomedical research, research that may cause death, bodily injury, pain, distress, fear, and trauma. Invasive research practices include techniques such as injecting a chimpanzee with a drug that would be detrimental to its health, infecting a chimp with a disease, cutting a chimp or removing body parts, and isolation or social deprivation. The vast majority of these animals--between 80 and 90 percent--aren't actually being used in research, but instead are warehoused, simply wasting away in these facilities. For example, approximately half of the government-owned chimpanzees are being held in a facility in New Mexico where no research is being conducted.…”