Doggies and Demerol

Katherine Mangu-Ward | November 9, 2007

PETA's Ingrid Newkirk broke her arm and told the sad tale of her injury thusly:

"Just as I was setting out to launch my new book, Let’s Have a Dog Party!, I met a wet floor and went splat, neatly snapping the bones in my wrist. Ooh, the pain! Thank goodness for IV drips."

The hypocrisy squad at The Center for Consumer Freedom is on Newkirk like white on rice:

We agree that IV (intravenous) drips of painkillers are a good thing. And we don’t know which drug she was on, assuming it didn’t come from PETA’s “Let's Have a Dog Party!” tackle box. But the most commonly prescribed IV painkillers, fentanyl and meperidine (Demerol), have both been extensively tested on animals.

In fact, the IV drip mechanism itself was tested on several species of animals during the 1930s, during the development of techniques for surgical anaesthesia.

The kicker:

Ingrid Newkirk, you may recall, once told a reporter that “even if animal research resulted in a cure for AIDS, we’d be against it.” Fair enough. But there’s a big difference between talking the talk and walking the walk.

Ron Bailey-style disclosure: My husband used to work for the Center for Consumer Freedom.

Addition disclosure: I, too, love IV Demerol.