Patents Deliberately Injured Rabbits
Groups urge the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to revoke patent

Since the first patent for an animal species was granted two decades ago, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has issued more than 660 patents giving "inventors" exclusive rights to commercial use of these specialized living creatures. Most of these animals are used in experiments, such those that are categorized under patent number 6,924,413—rabbits whose eyes are intentionally damaged so that researchers can study corneal epithelial damage (i.e., dry eye disease) affecting human beings. Actually, the patent also includes any non-human animal species—primates, dogs, cats, rodents, birds, farmed animals, etc.—who are cruelly altered by this surgical operation.

Three animal protection organizations—the American Anti-Vivisection Society (AAVS), the Alternatives Research & Development Foundation (ARDF), and the Patent Watch Project—are challenging the USPTO's decision based on the claim that it is unethical to patent living beings as though they were unfeeling machines. Issuing patents for animals provides the companies that "invent" these creatures with a financial incentive to produce them, as they can sell them to laboratories conducting specific types of research for which the animals are designed. This promotes the use of even more animals in experiments, in violation of the NIH Revitalization Act of 1993, which calls for reducing the number of animals used in research.

The rabbits who are used as the subjects of patent number 6,924,413 also suffer greatly as a result of their eye injuries. Their eyelids are forced open with glue or metal retractors to prevent them from blinking, then powdered sugar or salt is placed in their eyes for 20 to 60 minutes so as to damage their corneal surface layers. After the rabbits are used in experiments, they are discarded like any other spent lab equipment: only in this case, there are living creatures rather than inanimate creatures to dispose of.

Opposition to the patenting of animal species is consistent with IDA's Reallocation Campaign, which proposes that all research institutions and facilities redirect a minimum of five percent of their annual funding and resources away from animal experiments and toward the development and application of humane non-animal technologies. While IDA fully supports the effort to revoke patent number 6,924,413, we recommend that our members not contact the USPTO about this issue at this time. When and if they do decide to reevaluate this patent, we will revisit the issue and ask our readers to speak out.