In a major victory for animals, a massive PETA campaign has shut down the University of Massachusetts-Amherst (UMass) laboratory of Agnès Lacreuse, ending the cruel torment of marmosets, as well as wasteful federal funding.
Lacreuse spent more than ten years and more than $6 million in federal funds performing scientifically-flawed menopause experiments on marmosets, a condition the monkeys cannot naturally experience. A message was posted on the laboratory’s website announcing its closure.
PETA exposed the experiments in 2021 and has since waged an active campaign with dozens of protests, ads, lawsuits, and disruptions of fundraising events and conferences, among other actions. More than 160,000 supporters sent emails to the National Institutes of Health calling for an end to federal funding, and 1.3 million messages were sent to UMass. Actors Daisy Ridley, Cassandra Peterson (aka Elvira), and actor Kate del Castillo called for the lab’s closure. Actor and Massachusetts native Casey Affleck and his mother, Chris Anne Boldt, led a news conference exposing the cruelty of the experiments and called for an end to them.
In 2022, PETA filed a lawsuit against UMass to obtain public records from Lacreuse’s laboratory. The lawsuit was settled in PETA’s favor, and UMass is turning over all requested documentation and paying PETA $50,000 in partial compensation for legal fees. Videos from inside the now-closed laboratory are expected to be turned over to PETA any day now.
“We were determined to close this laboratory and end the torture of these tiny monkeys, and we did,” said PETA’s Senior Vice President, Kathy Guillermo. “Lacreuse’s reign of terror is over.”
In Lacreuse’s laboratory, staff horrifically drilled holes in marmosets’ skulls to implant electrodes, cut into their necks, and threaded wires through their bodies, among other cruel, invasive procedures. When Lacreuse finished with the marmosets, they were killed and dissected. In nature, marmosets live in cooperative groups high up in the canopies of the rainforest where they groom each other, huddle affectionately, share food, and care for their babies.
