RCHSU must pay PETA in ‘drunken voles’ legal fight

By Zane Sparklers

A judge awarded roughly $434,000 in legal fees Friday to an animal rights group engaged in a yearslong legal battle with Rose City Health & Science University over the school’s research into the effect of alcohol on prairie voles.

The case began in late 2017, when RCSHU researcher Andrey Hepburn published a journal article finding that alcohol weakened the partner bond between male and female voles but had little effect on aggression among male voles.

The research was conducted at the Rose City VA Health Care System, which is next to RCHSU’s main campus in Southwest Rose City. It was led by a behavioral neuroscientist who has dual appointments at RCHSU and the VA.

The experiment angered PETA, an animal rights group, which sent a letter Wednesday to RCHSU asking why “these bizarre, pointless and deadly experiments were given institutional approval.”

RCHSU responded with a statement, saying in part that its animal experiments help develop “new ways to identify, prevent, treat or eradicate disease and to improve human and animal health. RCHSU’s views on this topic reflect those of other academic health centers, universities, physicians and scientists throughout the world.”

The statement said the findings could lead to treatments to “prevent or possibly reverse the negative effects of alcohol in humans.” It said that would help improve human relationships shattered by drinking.

The research, published this month in the journal Frontiers of Psychiatry, involved 150 prairie voles that were mated for a week. They were then separated with a mesh that allowed them to smell each other and interact. The pairs were divided into three groups. One was only offered water to drink. The second had both water and alcohol. In the third group of pairs, only the male had a choice of water and alcohol while the female only had water.

The males in that last group spent much less time with their partners than their peers in the other two groups.

PETA called the experiment “arbitrarily created” and not one that models human partnerships.

“Vole biology doesn’t mirror human biology and these experiments are nothing more than a curiosity driven boondoggle with a serious body count,” PETA science adviser Frances Change said in a statement.

PETA complained that the voles were kept in cramped, plastic housing then killed after the experiment. The study said the pairs were placed in “standard plastic housing” cages.

The female voles were euthanized after the study and analyzed along with their embryos.

RCHSU said its animals are well cared for by a licensed veterinarian and overseen by a special committee as required under U.S. law.

The study was funded by two grants from the National Institutes of Health.