Death by Science: 6 Beagle Puppies Blinded, Killed in Failed Experiment

A flawed study conducted by the researchers at the University of Missouri-Columbia has blinded and killed six beagles.

According to Fox News, the researchers were trying to come up with "painless or non-invasive treatments for corneal injuries." The study titled "Effects of topical hyaluronic acid on corneal wound healing in dogs: a pilot study," has already been published online in April.

According to the procedure, they purposely blinded the six beagles with acid before dividing them in two groups. The other group received experimental product (Optimend^TM, containing 0.2 percent hyaluronic acid, KineticVet^TM) while the other received control product (Optimend^TM without 0.2 percent hyaluronic acid and supplemented with carboxymethylcellulose).

The study claimed all the purposely bred beagles, who were all less than a year old, were under sedation and anesthesia when they performed the experiment. As per result, the group wrote there is no accelerated corneal wound healing in clinical ophthalmic examination scores.

New York Daily notes that no puppy recovered from the damage inflicted on their left eyes. Thus, they were killed after the pilot study was over.

CBS St. Louis reports that the deaths of the dogs were raised to public's consciousness after the Los Angeles-based Beagle Freedom Project, who sued the university, noticed the troublesome study as they looked through the universities published animal research.

"[The university researchers] killed these six beagles after purposefully damaging their corneas pouring an experimental acid into them and then killing them when they're done because the experiment failed," Kevin Chase, Beagle Freedom Project's vice president, says.

Chase added that the failure can be attributed to the fact that the population involved in the study was short. Instead of using 24, they only used 6 to measure the efficiency of the topical treatment.

"This research was flawed before even one dog was procured, blinded or killed," he says.

Beagles have been primarily used for lab experiments. Early this May, a rescue mission was able to release 156 beagles from an animal testing laboratory in Bengaluru in southern India.