In 1995, the Tufts Center for Animals and Public Policy released a report that claimed, inter alia, that laboratory animal use in the USA had declined by 50% since its peak in the 1970s. Several animal activists criticized this claim. However, various data sets indicate...
After the ban on logging in Thailand, thousands of elephants became "unemployed." Some roamed the big cities like Bangkok, where mahouts sold fruit to citizens and tourists to feed their elephants. A city is not a good place for an elephant, but the elephants could...
In 1989, T Berry Brazelton, American pediatrician and author of numerous popular infant development and child-care books, was a plenary speaker at an international human-animal bond conference in Monaco. His talk included comments on an infant's attraction to and affinity with animals. He noted that...
According to reports by the US National Academy of Sciences and the European Commission, published in May this year, the US and Europe are experiencing an acute shortage of monkeys available for medical research, vaccine development, and product testing.Medical research using primates began in the...
In March 2014, the Humane Society Institute for Science and Policy organized a conference in Washington on animal sentience. Following the meeting, several participants asked whether any follow-up was planned. Their queries prompted the establishment of a new, open-peer-commentary journal, Animal Sentience, with cognitive scientist...
Wild birds are important for their contributions to ecosystem health and human well-being. Critical ecological roles provided by birds include insect and rodent control, plant pollination, and seed dispersal. Wild birds have also captivated humans for millennia, and today, the avid birder or “twitcher” is...
In graduate school at the University of California at Davis, I specialized in primate socialization and attachment disruption when animals were separated from their mothers at an early age. I was as prepared as anyone to evaluate Willie B’s prospects for socialization, but his future...
As the director of Animal People, I had the opportunity to attend the second part of the U.N. Biodiversity Conference – also known as the 15th Conference of Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, or COP 15. COP 15 was convened in Montreal in...
Such an Array of Umwelts Ed Yong’s 2022 instant classic, An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us, delves into the senses of our animal cousins, including sight, sound, pain, smell, touch, vibrations, electric fields, and magnetic fields, and explains for the...
Progress following the Passage of the 2022 Animal Welfare, Environment and Sustainable Development Resolution at the UN Environment Assembly In March of this year (2022), the UN Environment Assembly passed a Resolution (EA.5/Res.1) that requested the Executive Director of the UN Environment Program (UNEP) in Nairobi,...
