Free Republic

PARIS (AFP) – France used soldiers as guinea pigs in nuclear tests in the 1960s, deliberately exposing them to radiation from atomic blasts to test the effects, according to a report revealed on Tuesday. The secret military report, obtained by AFP, said that between 1960 and 1966 France sent troops onto Algerian desert test sites "to study the physiological and psychological effects caused on humans by an atomic weapon." One operation in 1961 involved military personnel advancing on foot and in trucks to within a few hundred metres (yards) of the epicentre of a nuclear blast less than an hour...

LONDON: The ethical aspect notwithstanding, an Italian doctor has claimed to have cloned three human babies who are "healthy" and now living in eastern Europe. "I helped give birth to three children with the human cloning technique. It involved two boys and a girl who are nine years old today. They were born healthy and they are in excellent health now," the Daily Telegraph quoted Severino Antinori as telling the 'Oggi' weekly. "The women's eggs were impregnated in a laboratory through a method called 'nuclear transfer'," he said, adding that the method used was "an improvement" over the technique used...

Peter Gurney, who died on July 2 aged 68, was a campaigner for the rights and welfare of guinea pigs, and regularly brought the animals into the wards of Great Ormond Street Hospital, where the children called him “The Guinea Pig Man”.Born at Luton on March 9 1938, Peter Gurney was educated at Beech Hill Secondary Modern and did his National Service with the Navy. He then became a bus and lorry driver. His career as a guinea pig expert began when he was 48; he was twice divorced and facing redundancy when he bought a guinea pig from his...

THREE animal rights activists were jailed for 12 years each and a fourth imprisoned for four years for a terror campaign against an English guinea pig farm that culminated in a grave robbing. John Ablewhite, Kerry Whitburn and John Smith were today each handed 12-year prison terms at Nottingham Crown Court in central England after pleading guilty to a charge of conspiring to blackmail the farm owners. Josephine Mayo was jailed for four years after admitting a lesser part in the six-year campaign against the Hall family who own a farm in Staffordshire, central England, which bred the rodents for...

Drug test subject 'looks like elephant man' says girlfriend (Filed: 15/03/2006) The girlfriend of a man fighting for life after taking part in a pharmaceuticals trial has said the drugs he was given have left him looking "like the Elephant Man". Myfanwy Marshall Myfanwy Marshall, 35, said her boyfriend, a 28-year-old British man who had taken part in drug trials before without adverse side effects, felt ill 80 or 90 minutes after being given the drug on Monday. He is now in the intensive care unit at at Northwick Park hospital in north-west London. Five other men were also admitted...

EDINBURGH, January 16, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A decision by Scottish lawmakers to allow same-sex couples to adopt has been condemned by Roman Catholic prelate Cardinal Keith O’Brien, who warned that the measure would make Scotland’s orphans “guinea pigs in some distorted social experiment.” The Cardinal has asked that Catholic adoption agencies be allowed a “conscience clause” to exempt them from the ruling, so as not to be forced to place children in homes with same-sex guardians. O’Brien is worried that Catholic adoption agencies would eventually be forced into placing children with same-sex couples. Galloway Bishop John Cunningham, chair of the...

A guinea pig called Sooty enjoyed a night of passion with 24 females after fooling his way into their cage in south Wales. Sooty wooed the lady guinea pigs, one by one, and has now become the proud father of 42 baby guinea pigs from his two nights of passion. His endeavours left staff at Little Friend's Farm, Hopkinstown, Pontypridd, amazed at his stamina. Park owner Carol Feehan, 42, said: "I'm sure a lot of men will be looking at Sooty with envy. Sooty had two nights of passion "We knew that Sooty had gone missing and we looked for...

The Web log TV Newser, citing "multiple Fox News employees" as its source, is reporting that the company ordered the insecticide diazinon be sprayed in its roach-infested New York newsroom, exposing numerous employees to a chemical that is banned by the EPA for indoor use. One Fox employee wrote that she and her colleagues had decided to go public with the matter because "diazinon -- which disrupts the nervous and endocrine systems -- is highly suspect in one of the female producers here having a child with Down's Syndrome. That is a major liability that no company, however noble their...

DoD May Restart Anthrax Shots United Press International December 16, 2004 WASHINGTON - Several months after a federal court ruled against the Department of Defense's mandatory anthrax vaccination program, the DOD has requested an emergency ruling so it can continue to give the controversial vaccine to soldiers. The authorization request was made in a letter from Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz to outgoing Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson. "I have determined there is a significant potential for a military emergency involving a heightened risk to the United States military forces of an attack with anthrax," said Wolfowitz...

WASHINGTON -- Mark Ammend of Collierville can't talk about it now. The former fire chief for the 164th Air National Guard unit based at Memphis International Airport got vaccinated against anthrax five years ago. Now, as he lies in a specially designed bed, the only thing he can move is his left eye. Fully conscious and aware, Ammend, 55, is a quadriplegic with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig's disease. A new book suggests he and many other soldiers immunized against anthrax during the 1991 Gulf War and since are suffering auto-immune diseases after receiving an illegal chemical adjuvant...

Please spread this message far and wide. We now have a petition on line to stop Georgetown University's use of aborted fetal cell lines. If GU gets away with this, kiss the ethical vaccine deal we are on the verge of negotiating with Chiron goodbye...why bother with it if the Catholic scholars are saying the immoral research is okay? If the research at GU is acceptable then surely tainted vaccines are too, so why bother getting untainted ones? And why bother with the new Fair Labeling and Informed Consent Legislation: See www.cogforlife.org/flica.htm proposed to Congress Jan 20th? If it is...

United States troops have entered the Northern Iraqi town of Tikrit.General Tommy Franks says the Marines had met little resistance, but he cautioned against hopes that the war was about to end.Tikrit, a city 175 kilometers North of Baghdad, is the last Iraqi centre not controlled by United States forces.Saddams concentration of power among his closest family, and distrust of most people outside his Albu Nasir tribe, meant Tikrit forms the backbone of his most loyal military forces.Despite apparent progress in Tikrit, General Franks said military action would not end until pockets of Iraqi resistance were under control.