Letters to the Editor

Wednesday, August 12, 2009 at 2 a.m.

As a neurosurgeon for 20 years in the Army, including combat deployment, and over 15 years treating civilian trauma, I strongly oppose the Navy’s use of live animals in combat trauma training courses. With the advancement of medical simulation, the continued maiming and killing of pigs and other animals in these courses is unnecessary.

Years ago, I took a training course similar to these using live animals. Even then I found the exercise cruel and useless. Pig or goat anatomy simply is not the same as a human’s.

. According to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals), most top medical schools have abandoned the use of animals in surgical training. The Air Force Expeditionary Medical Skills Institute’s Center for Sustainment of Trauma and Readiness Skills as well as the Navy Trauma Training Center have confirmed that they do not use any animals for trauma training exercises. How can we keep ignoring the fact that animals have a right to life and a right to be treated humanely?

Your factoids tell the truth: 104 million pigs killed for meat each year; 2,900 pigs killed each year for medical training. There is no way a robotic or human simulator can take the place of trying to save the life of a breathing, bleeding animal/human. I rest my case.

“These are only pigs,” some would say. “But, they are life!”, is my answer. They are a creation beyond the understanding of all of us. Until we humans learn to respect all life and to treat it reverently, we will probably continue to create wars which cause the terrible wounds that kill marines.

As a cardiologist and medical educator, I’m certain that the Navy’s use of live pigs for combat trauma training is not only unnecessary but substandard. Inflicting stab wounds, gunshot wounds and burns on animals is no way to train anyone how to treat severe injuries in humans, and thus it is egregiously cruel.

The military can give our men and women on the front lines superior care by having its medics and corpsmen train on medical simulators, in simulated combat environments, and in military or civilian trauma centers. Animals have no place in modern medical training.

Cmdr. Bryan Schumacher, a surgeon at Camp Pendleton who obviously has been in warfare, and Navy doctors who were trained using both simulators and live pigs felt that while the simulator was good, it wasn’t the same as a living subject hemorrhaging and the life connection this intense trauma presents. Surely, physicians who have seen combat are better authorities regarding traumatic wounds in combat.

It’s disturbing to see PETA and the misnamed Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine — both animal rights groups — campaigning against the use of pigs for military medical trauma training. Eventually, every corpsman faces his or her first attempt to pack a gunshot wound, stop a bleeding artery, or cut into a patient to restore a breathing airway. And those first attempts are where most mistakes are made. I’d rather see it happen on a pig than on one of our uniformed fighting men or women.

Congresswoman Susan Davis has at least four town halls scheduled during August. I have no doubt that right-wing hooligans will make every effort to disrupt the proceedings. We may well recall how a similar “riot” was choreographed during the 2000 Florida election when hundreds of business suits tried to interfere with vote counting, thus saddling us with George W. Bush and his cronies for eight years. There’s a difference this time, however. This country is no longer run only by old white men. Our diverse population has managed to elect an African-American president. Because of this sea-change in our population, this effort to derail town-hall meetings is going to backfire big time. It will be seen for what it is: a desperate attempt to injure President Obama by those who feel their country has been stolen from them.

The events at the town-hall meetings are a genuine grass-roots reaction to the frustration felt by the majority of voters. We are having Obamacare shoved down our throats. As a consultant in the energy industry for 50 years, the proposed cap-and-trade bill is a disaster and will end up costing all of us a fortune more for energy with a resultant significant negative impact on the economy.

I hope that those who are protesting a plan to provide universal health care in the United States are not receiving Medicare or Medicaid. And I hope that others opposing universal coverage have asked their parents and grandparents to give up Medicare benefits as well. Anyone currently enjoying the benefits of “socialized medicine” in the form of Medicare or Medicaid should immediately relinquish those benefits. The rest of us would like them.

Re: “Just fix it / Crew puts an end to cover-up, clears overgrown sidewalk” (Our Region, July 22):

I am known for being vocal about things I do not agree with. However, one of your staff members — Jeff Ristine — deserves a great deal of praise. I tried for 10 months to get the city to fix a light on the corner of Tivoli and Devonshire. Ten months. I finally wrote to Ristine, and within 3 weeks the light was fixed.

Whomever he talked to listened — and I am very grateful for the outcome. Thanks, Jeff.

Re: “ ‘Cougars’ make tracks at Del Mar” (A1, Aug. 6):

Kudos to the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club for its creation of the “Miss Cougar” competition and the advancement of women’s liberation. However, in all fairness, the “sport of kings” should acknowledge stealing a page from OMBAC’s Over-the-Line Tournament with its “Miss Emerson” competition.

Re: “Pilots for regional airlines rest uneasy in a transient life / Commutes, poor pay force flight crews into group living situations” (Business, Aug. 5):

I think all this nonsense on regional pilots not getting enough sleep and too little pay is union and media hype. It is more dangerous to ride in a taxi or a bus than it is to fly on a commercial airline. There were zero fatalities on scheduled U.S.-originated airline flights in 2007 and 2008. Given this, shouldn’t we be more concerned about the rest our taxi driver gets than our airline pilot? The answer is yes, but it just doesn’t make a good story.