By EMS1 Staff
SEATTLE — A college student is working to prevent the use of live pigs in paramedic training classes.
Sequim Gazette reported that University of Washington student Victoria Cummins has been working with the Campus Animal Rights Educators club for three years to prevent the King County’s Medic One Paramedics program from using live pigs while teaching students how to open airways in emergency situations.
Cummins said alternative simulator models should be used instead of the 30-40 live pigs that are used to practice cricothyrotomy, and she added that more than 100 paramedic programs are already using them.
The CARE club received 1,125 signatures for a petition that asks the school to make the switch.
“We wanted to show them that the UW community doesn’t support the program’s use of pigs and here are some students who don’t support what’s happening,” Cummins said.
The club had a meeting with King County executive Dow Constantine, who told them that the program plans to phase the pigs out of use.
The paramedic program’s leaders said training on the pigs gives the student a replication of the stress of the procedure because the animals have similar tissue as humans. They said they plan on developing their own simulator model and switching over to that by 2020.
https://www.facebook.com/UWCARE/videos/2087984441431586/