Pigs Shot, Set On Fire in Military Trauma Training
Tell DOD to Stop Cruel Training Exercises, Develop More Appropriate Human Trauma Models
- November 9, 2006
A recent article in The New York Times profiled a Navy medic in Iraq who is treating wounded combat soldiers. In interviewing the medic, the Times asked the 22-year-old how he trained for the job. The medic said he took several courses before he was deployed, including one advanced trauma treatment program where instructors gave each corpsman an anesthetized pig. His pig was shot eight times and set on fire during a 15-hour time period during which the medic worked to keep the pig alive.
Excerpt from the article: (NYTimes, Nov. 2, 2006)
Petty Officer Kirby began to list the schools he had attended to be ready for this moment. Some he had paid for himself, he said, to be extra-prepared.
In one course, an advanced trauma treatment program he had taken before deploying, he said, the instructors gave each corpsman an anesthetized pig.
"The idea is to work with live tissue," he said. "You get a pig and you keep it alive. And every time I did something to help him, they would wound him again. So you see what shock does, and what happens when more wounds are received by a wounded creature."
"My pig?" he said. "They shot him twice in the face with a 9-millimeter pistol, and then six times with an AK-47 and then twice with a 12-gauge shotgun. And then he was set on fire."
"I kept him alive for 15 hours," he said. "That was my pig," he said.
For complete article, go to:
Please contact the Secretary of Defense and chairs of the Congressional Armed Services Committees about this matter.
* Urge them to cut funding for and endorsement of this type of training.
* Tell them that there is enough violence in the world and that causing animals to suffer over human-made conflicts is inappropriate
* Tell them that there are humane ways to learn about trauma medicine, including by participating with human physicians in hospitals all over the United States on patients who have been shot or are severely injured and in need of trauma care.
Contact information follows:
Donald H. Rumsfeld
Secretary of Defense
1000 Defense Pentagon
Washington, DC 20301-1000
Rep. Duncan Hunter, Chair
House Armed Services Committee
2120 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Senator John Warner, Chair
Senate Armed Services Committee
228 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
###