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News of the Week, April 2010.

In This edition:

1. Video: Hare Dying in Hare Coursing!

2. The Ban Irish Fur Farms Campaign reaches the 10,000 signatures!

3. A Shock of Reality.

4. Barnardo Furriers court case fails again (Part 1) – 3 Court Cases, 3 Vindications. Part 1

5. Barnardo Furriers court case fails again (Part 2) – A Camera that Saw too much !

6. ALiberation now on facebook

Based in The USA, Procter and Gamble (P&G) are a worldwide producer of personal, household and pharmaceutical goods. P&G also manufacture chemicals for their own products. P&G are part of the pharmaceutical industry.

P&G are behind at least 250 brands in household products, beauty care, food and beverages, health care.

Popular brands include Ariel, Daz, Fairy, Max factor, Pantene, Head & Shoulders, Oil of Olaz and "pet" food such as Eukanuba and Iams.

All these products are the result of massive rights violations and torture practices on nonhuman animals.

Procter & Gamble spend millions of dollars to advertise themselves as a responsible, caring company. They also claim to be a leader in the development of “alternatives” to the use of animals in product testing.

Despite all these claims, Procter & Gamble refuse to release to the public information regarding the actual numbers and species of animals used, or the types of tests they force nonhumans to endure.

"Procter & Gamble wants ultimately to eliminate the need for all animal testing of products and ingredients for human use. We use non-animal alternatives whenever possible."
Procter and Gamble.

Although P&G publicly claim to be committed to eliminating animal testing experiments, they do the exact opposite by promoting animal testing through the use of new-to-the-world chemicals ingredients.

For example, P&G are pushing for a massive new animal testing programme regarding the use of new, ultra-tiny “nanoparticles” for their cosmetics and toiletries products. These ultra tiny nanoparticles can penetrate skin and hair in ways that naturally occurring molecules don’t.
In one experiment, scientists at P&G exposed 344 female rats via an aspiration model to fluorescently labeled polystyrene ranging in size from 20 nm to 400 nm. The nonhumans were killed 1, 3, 7 and 14 days after exposure to nanoparticles. Lung, heart, brain, spleen, kidney and liver tissues were removed and preserved for histological examination.
Inserting a needle into nonhumans’ windpipes, force-feeding huge doses of the material, and rubbing it into raw, damaged skin are also part of the common torture nonhumans endure so nanoparticles can be used on P&G products.

Common torture practices also involve “genetically engineering”, skin irritancy tests ‎in hair care and fabric softener tests, toxicity tests where nonhumans are force fed large amount of a cleaning chemical by stomach tube, poisoning with colouring agents, synthetic musk fragrance and optical brighteners, etc.

"At P&G, animal testing of non-food/non-drug ingredients and products is only carried out when required by law, or when there is no alternative test available to ensure the human safety of new ingredients or products."
Procter and Gamble.

This statement is meant to trick the consumer by giving the impression that the law requires animal tests for consumer products.
Both in the USA and Europe, there is only a legal requirement to test chemicals on animals where the company uses new-to-the-world chemical ingredients in their products. The law does not ask P&G to use nanoparticules or genetically engineering for the release of new products on the market.

P&G also conduct animal tests that are not required by law :

Rabbits are still used by P&G in the notorious Draize eye irritancy test and developmental toxicity (See right column for more info). Once again, in the USA, the law does not require that these tests be performed on animals. Many companies continue to use the Draize test because their legal departments and insurance companies suggest they do so to cover themselves when they are sued.

In 2004, published scientific papers show that for their products "Herbal Essence" and "Oil of Olaz", P&G force-fed butylparaben - a preservative already-approved and used for decades in personal care products - to pregnant rats to see the effects on their offsprings. The experiment done in the United States killed 100 pregnant mothers and their 1,200 newborns.
Facing criticism, P&G has responded by saying that the testing of the chemical in question was performed at the request of European regulators on behalf of the entire cosmetics industry to ensure the continued safe use of parabens.
Once again, these tests are not required by any law, detailed information on this ingredient have been widely available for many years, and in vitro tests were already done to study the effects of this ingredient.

In toxicity tests, P&G has used the Lethal Dose 50, known as LD50 for household products such as Joy (test done in 2000) and Febreeze (Test done in 2004). Once again, the LD50 test is not required by the US law concerning cosmetics and household products/ingredients.Computer modeling and human cell and tissue culture techniques are among the available non-animal methods.(See right column for more info)

P&G refuses to end animal experimentation, despite the fact that scientific non-animal testing methods do exist.

P&G relies on these archaic experiments strictly for their own protection from liability lawsuits.
In case of death or disability caused by chemical products,the responsible companies claim due diligence by pointing out that they performed the legally prescribed "safety tests" on animals and are therefore not accountable.

P&G could stop all animal testing today without putting in danger anyone’s health. Actually if they cared about their consumer’s health, they would instead use scientific methods, such as human cell, corneal and skin tissue cultures, computer and mathematical models, as animal testing has been proven to be unscientific, unreliable and dangerous for human health.

New products can be produced by using the more than 8,000 ingredients and combinations already available and considered safe or use natural ingredients already known to be safe. Together with test-tube methods and ethical volunteer studies of new products, consumer safety will be assured.

P&G sees nonhumans as mere tools to use for their own profits. They come as a cheap and easy way to release new ingredients to the market.

By buying P&G products, you endorse their practices. P&G not only violates the rights of nonhuman animals, they also pollute the environment with their chemical loaded products, are harmful to human health due to the toxicity of their ingredients, and violate human rights by using sweatshop labour.

Companies with much smaller budgets than P&G have shown a true commitment to elimating animal experiments by developing products without the use of animals.
They do not contain such harsh chemical ingredients, do not pollute the environment and respect both human and nonhuman rights.

We highly recommend everyone boycott P&G and switch to ethical products.

For a list of ethical products, see Ethical brands.

... on human rights and the environment.

www.chinalaborwatch.org:
Procter & Gamble in China: Workers Fall Through the Cracks.

www.equalexchange.coop:
Fair Trade Coffee Leader Unconvinced by Procter & Gamble Announcement.

www.greenpeace.org:
New tests confirm TBT poison in Procter and Gamble's Pampers.

www.corpwatch.org:
India: Illegal GMO's Found in Baby Formula, Potato Chips.

www.greenpeace.org:
Household brands accused of "cooking the climate".

www.greenpeace.org:
Palm oil : once you pop, you can't stop.

www.naturalnews.com:
FDA Warns Proctor and Gamble about Unlawful Marketing Claims with Hand Sanitizer for Kids.

The Draize test:

www.pg.com:
Draize test and P&G.

Sharpe R. The Draize test - motivations for change.
food and Chemical Toxicology 1985; 23:139-143

Freeberg FE, Hooker DT, Griffith JF. Correlation of Animal eye test data with human experience for household products :an update. Journal of Toxicology - cutaneous & occular Toxicology 1986, 5: 115-123.

www.cosmeticsdesign.com:
P&G fights back against UK animal protection charity.

www.hurtfulessences.org:
butylparaben tested on pregnant animals for "Herbal Essence".

www.timesonline.co.uk:
Beauty brand tainted by US animal testing.

www.mattek.com:
The use of fluorescently labelled nanoparticles to determine the effect of particle size on translocation from the lung.

www.uncaged.co.uk:
Cell Culture Tests More Accurate Than Lethal Animal Tests

whatsinproducts.com:
LD50 used for Febreeze.

www.monsterjanitorial.com:
LD50 used for Joy.

P&G was founded in the USA in 1837 by English and Irish immigrants William Procter and James Gamble.

P&G made its fortune selling soaps and candles to the Union armies during the civil war, with soldiers coming back home with P&G products.
P&G stopped selling candles when the electric light bulb arrived to the market and instead continued selling soaps.

One reason for P&G's domestic success has been their reliance on a combination of consumer research, advertising, and distribution techniques.

In 2005, by acquiring Gillette, P&G became the largest consumer goods company, placing UNILEVER into second place.

Click on the picture to view the list of their products in Vegaplanet.

IAM company was aquired by P&G in 1999.
IAM products and ingredients are also tested on animals.
Cats cut open, made obese and then starved, kidney failure inflicted, etc. The list of rights violations and torture practice is endless.
Read the full report: the Iams exposé.

The Draize test involves putting a substance into the eye or on the skin of an immobilized albino rabbit, and then observing and recording the results over an average period of 72 hours.
Their eyes often are held open with clips at the lid, and rabbits can break their necks or backs struggling to escape.
Reactions to the irritants can include swelling of the eyelid, inflammation of the iris, ulceration, hemorrhaging, and blindness.
Pain-relieving drugs usually are not administered because vivisectors claim their use would interfere with test results.
Rabbits are used for this test because of the low amount of tears produced by rabbits' eyes, allowing the substance to remain in the eye instead of being washed out.

The Draize test brings results that are totally unreliable in predicting human toxicity.
Humans and rabbits differ in the structure of their eyelids and corneas, as well as in their ability to produce tears.
When comparing rabbit to human data on duration of eye inflammation after exposure to 14 household products, they differed by a factor of 18 to 250.
A battery of in vitro tests would be less expensive and likely far more accurate than the Draize test.

The LD50 Test involves forcing a chemical into nonhumans’ throats or pumping into their stomachs by a tube, to see if it is poisonous when swallowed.
Increasing doses are given to the victims until half of them (50%) die. The nonhumans are observed for 7 to 14 days. At the end of the test, all animals are killed.
Rats and mice are mostly the victims of this cruel test, although rabbits, guinea pigs or dogs are also used.

Not only is the LD50 test a violation of nonhuman rights but it is also scientifically unsound. Results differ not only from humans to nonhumans, but also between species members. A product can be up to 10 times more toxic in one species than in another.
Many factors also affect the test, such as the age and sex of the nonhumans. The results of this test vary so much that they cannot guarantee human safety.

For more information on P&G: www.uncaged.co.uk
www.boycottpandg.co.uk