SOURCE: HSUS

MILITARY USES LIVE GOATS FOR "WOUND TRAINING": The HSUS has received information from credible sources that the U.S. Army will be injuring and then killing live goats as part of a training program for its medics in treating battle wounds. KUSA-TV, the Colorado Springs Gazette, and other media outlets have confirmed that the goats will be used to simulate battle wounds and injuries. After they are treated by medics, the goats will be killed. The use of goats to train for battle wound treatment is inadvisable for the same reasons the public opposed shooting dogs for military experiments twenty years ago. Not only are such exercises inhumane, they are of questionable relevance because the anatomy of humans is markedly different from that of goats and conditions on the battlefield are not easily replicated. Any data garnered from these trainings may be misleading. Because more realistic and humane alternatives exist, such as the TraumaMan® System (a simulator of the human body used for surgical training) or emergency rooms in metropolitan areas, the Army's crude goat injury and killing exercises are all the more objectionable. WHAT YOU CAN DO: Let Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld know that military training should use the most advanced techniques, rather than such an archaic approach that needlessly wounds and kills animals. Ask him to instead adopt reasonable, humane alternatives. The Honorable Donald H. Rumsfeld Secretary of Defense 1000 Defense Pentagon Washington, DC 20301 Fax 703-697-9080 Phone 703-692-7100 To send an email, go to http://www.defenselink.mil/