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It sounds like they had put some thought into which methods cause the least suffering. It doesn't sound like they were trying to skirt the edge of what the ethi
by shard 4y ago
It sounds like they had put some thought into which methods cause the least suffering. It doesn't sound like they were trying to skirt the edge of what the ethics committee would allow, which is how I read your comment. Please let me know if I have misinterpreted.
As to possible alternative methods, those include freezing, which could be quite prolonged and painful, and blunt force trauma, which could be difficult/ambiguous to perform correctly and confirm correctness every time.
- verisimi 4y agoYour assumption is that the mice must die. Given that its the case, you then wonder about the most effective means of killing them. But, pushing back on your assumption, what value can there possibly be in killing baby mice?
- drdeca 4y agoFeeding snakes?
- shard 4y agoDo you mean in general? There are two reasons given in this thread: medical research and pet (snake) food. I expect I don't need to explain why it's best to kill the mice humanely for medical research which involve dissection of some sort. For snake food, it's best to feed mice that have been euthanized. Feeding live mice is cruel to the mice, who experience terror right before death, and there is also the possibility that a struggling mice could injure the snake.
- taylodl 4y agoAbsolutely - this is a world-renowned medical research school and since they always have interns you can expect this question has been asked many, many times. They feel the need to explain it in their orientation because they know some of the students are going to be shocked by the procedure. My daughter did say it's done so fast and the mice are so accustomed to being handled there doesn't appear to be any fear on the mouse's part and there doesn't appear to be any suffering, let alone needless suffering. Funny anecdote - the first time she was in the lab when they were doing this she hadn't had breakfast that day and had a light dinner the night before and she fainted from low blood sugar. Took her a couple of days to convince them no, she was fine, she just let her blood sugar get too low.