One year after a damning investigative report by CTV’s W5 pulled back the curtain on alarming abuses of test animals at a West Island research facility, animal-rights activists plan to make their return.
A year ago, the program’s report detailing researchers physically abusing test animals prompted hundreds of demonstrators to show up at ITR Labs’s facility in Baie d’Urfé. Today, dozens came back to mark the anniversary and bring attention back to the animal’s plight.
Rob Boisvert from animal activist group 269 Life says that things have not gotten better at the animal facility over the past year. “Nothing has changed, animal testing is still going on at that lab,” he said in an interview with CJAD 800 News.
Chris Eustace, a retired teacher who lives in the area, said he was disappointed at the lack of a response from all levels of government after ITR’s conduct came to light last year. He said the protests last year garnered a two-page written response from local federal MP Francis Scarpaleggia, but a whole year on, they still haven’t heard anything from local MNA Geoff Kelly.
Action from Québec City, especially in an election year, is seen as an excellent starting place. Boisvert says that after the province’s recent declarations of animals as “sentient beings”, it’s time that they walked the walk, too.
Another protester named Reed said that because of Canada’s self-image as a “peaceful and progressive” country, few people are often aware of our lax laws on animal-testing, which both he and Boisvert described as among the weakest in the developed world. “Even China has banned animal testing,” he lamented.