February 27, 2009 Victory E-mails and Letters of Protest DO Save Lives and Change Policies. Let Your Voices Be Heard for Dogs and Cats

"YIPEE, You Guys!! WE ended the use of the MI dogs in those horrible EMT Training course where they were being intentionally injured to teach the students how to deal with Trauma!

Uof MI will no longer use those poor dogs, many of whom from the Montcalm shelter some of you post for on this site!

Here is the letter I just received:

************************************************************

Ryan Merkley
Manager of Humane Education Programs
rmerkley@pcrm.org


Visit the SaveMichiganDogs.org Facebook Cause

Subscribe to future PCRM e-mail communications


Dear [CT LADY]:

Your activism just made a huge difference. Six weeks ago we called on you to help end the cruel and unnecessary use of live dogs in the University of Michigan’s trauma training course. Thousands of you took action—and the school listened! Today, the University of Michigan announced that it will use only simulators in the Advanced Trauma Life Support course.

You have sent more than 20,000 e-mails to University of Michigan (U-M) administrators, asking them to use nonanimal training methods in their Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) course. The school’s Graduate Medical Education Committee recently met and decided that it agrees with you. No dogs or other animals will be killed in the school’s ATLS course, according to a university statement.

Your hard work helped end animal suffering and improve medical education in Michigan.

Now we need your help to do the same thing in New Jersey. While more than 90 percent of United States and Canadian facilities no longer use animals for ATLS training, University Hospital in Newark, part of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ), continues to use live pigs for its course, despite the availability of nonanimal alternatives like the TraumaMan System from Simulab. The hospital’s next ATLS course is scheduled for March 13.

Please e-mail, call, or write to UMDNJ president William Owen Jr., M.D., and politely ask him to end animal use in University Hospital’s ATLS course. Being polite is the most effective way to help these animals. Send an automatic e-mail:

William Owen Jr., M.D.
President
University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey
65 Bergen St., Room 1535
University Heights
Newark, NJ 07107-3007
Phone: 973-972-4400
E-mail: wfowenmd@umdnj.edu

If you have any questions, please contact me at rmerkley@pcrm.org. Thanks so much for your help!


Best regards,

Ryan Merkley
Manager of Humane Education Programs


Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
5100 Wisconsin Ave., N.W., Ste. 400
Washington, DC 20016 Phone: 202-686-2210
E-mail: info@pcrm.org
*************************************************************
Thank you to everybody who helped end this horrible practice on dogs in Michigan, many of who came from the Montcalm shelter some of you do work for."