Together with the Animal Protection Party of Canada, Animal Alliance of Canada recently exposed the practice of “live tissue training” by the Department of National Defence (DND) where 10-week-old piglets are exposed to toxic nerve agents, irradiated until their skin is burned and have severe trauma inflicted on their bodies. This is a horrific reality for these babies to endure in Canada’s live tissue training.
We shared the fact that in just the past 10 years alone, over 1,800 pigs have lost their lives to these cruel training exercises.
It’s a terrible fact, but we all see heart-breaking statistics about animals every day. Seeing the numbers makes it difficult to relate to what individual animals experience so we’d like to share the story of Sophia.
Sophia was the only piglet in over 3,200 pages of documents from the DND to be assigned a name. Like the others, she was also given a number: 4552. We don’t know why the DND deemed her worthy of a name, but we do have an idea of what happened to her because of her anesthesia record.
Sophia was bred on a special farm to be used for medical research and training — her world consisted of concrete and metal. She was hauled to Defence Research and Development Canada (DRDC) in Suffield, Alberta on November 16th. There, she was held in a cramped pen for five days. Her access to food was removed for a full 24 hours on the last of those five days. On November 22nd two handlers came in with a large plywood board and cornered her while another jabbed her with a needle. She was then transferred to a gurney for the training exercise to begin. At 8:06 am she was injected with a drug that was not in the DND’s approved anesthesia protocol and is not a general anesthetic, but no one seemed to care.
Although the anesthesia protocol called for Sophia to receive anesthetic “top-ups” at regular intervals over the four-hour-long training exercise, they were stopped just over an hour in. During this time Sophia was clearly reviving as her record indicates that she was “making some sounds.” It’s likely she was also coughing, wheezing and having difficulty breathing as she was administered yet another drug that wasn’t in the approved protocol which is designed to open constricted airways.
We can only imagine the level of suffering she endured during this time. All we know from the remainder of her anesthesia record is that she was euthanized with an injection of Euthanyl at 12:05 pm when presumably no more could be taken from her. Her lifeless body was then thrown into an incinerator. All that remains of her is a cold, factual anesthesia record.
Sophia’s story of suffering reminds us that behind each of those 1,800 piglets was a unique and sensitive individual. And it urges us to keep fighting for them to end Canada’s live tissue training.
Late February, National Defence Critic and MP, Lindsay Mathyssen, sponsored our government petition calling on the Minister of National Defence at that time, Anita Anand, to stop the DND’s practice of “live tissue training.” The petition closed on June 28th and gathered 2253 signatures from across Canada. We made it clear to the Minister that Canadians will not tolerate the DND’s abuse of animals.
The fact of the matter is, the suffering inflicted on Sophia and all of the piglets used for Canada’s “live tissue training” is paid for with our tax dollars, without our cooperation or consent. Meanwhile, we and the animals must rely on you. For Sophia and all the others like her, please consider becoming a monthly donor. Your monthly gift will help in our ongoing fight to finally bring an end to the DND’s abuse of animals for “live tissue training.”
Thank you for standing with us in defence of piglets like Sophia.
