The impression that Covance (Germany) clearly intends to give on its website is of a professional business with highly trained staff. It boasts on its website "the foundation of our success is the experience of our scientific staff. We're proud of our people."
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We doubt very much, however, that Covance (Germany) will be quite so proud to have the blatantly unprofessional and callous behaviour of some of its staff so publicly exposed by the BUAV. EU Directive 86/609 says that lab staff should be competent as well as "sympathetic, gentle and firm when associating with animals." Over the years the BUAV has shown again and again that sympathy and compassion are routinely absent in any animal lab; how could it be otherwise with people paid to harm animals on a daily basis? Covance (Germany) is no exception; many of the staff were physically as well as verbally aggressive to the animals, creating a highly threatening atmosphere.
Handling by humans is stressful enough for lab primates, but here there was excessive and rough handling. Certain staff were extremely rough when capturing monkeys in their cage, literally dragging them out for dosing. The BUAV video shows one clearly distressed monkey trying desperately to avoid the gloved hand thrust into his cage by screeching, clawing, pulling and twisting to avoid being taken away for yet another experimental procedure.
Once a procedure is over, technicians can be seen on the video literally throwing the animals back into their cages, particularly if they didn't 'comply' during a procedure. One poor monkey suffered a broken arm from being forcibly restrained. She can be seen on the BUAV video alone in her cage, balanced on her tiny piece of wood, her broken arm hanging limply by her side.
Monkeys were often carried around by staff with no regard for their welfare at all. Dangled by just one limb, the entire weight of the animal's body was on the wrist which risked leading to injuries like shoulder dislocation. One technician was filmed walking down a corridor with a monkey carried over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
Noise can be a form of additional stress for lab animals, particularly for very sensitive creatures like monkeys. At Covance (Germany) the staff seemed to go about their daily routine in an atmosphere of excessive noise, shouting and fooling around, and in some units with a permanent background of blaring disco and techno music.
Caught on the BUAV camera, staff can be seen entertaining themselves by mocking and taunting the monkeys, even whilst they were being subjected to dosing and in full view of more senior staff who seemed to take no notice whatsoever. Monkeys were forced to 'dance' to disco music blaring on the radio, staff moving the animals' limbs like puppets and even rocking their heads in time to a song whilst another member of staff is seen trying to insert a tube down the throat for oral dosing.
Rather than respecting the animals as intelligent, sentient beings, certain staff routinely degraded them, robbing them of their dignity and playing with them for their own amusement. On one occasion during a procedure, a technician used an anaesthetised monkey's hand to simulate a drumstick, tapping it on the table along with the radio music whilst another technician danced and sang moronically in the background. A senior animal technician was the person responsible for turning on the music and increasing the volume, whilst two more senior members of staff attending to the anaesthetised monkey made no effort to put a stop to what was happening in front of them.
Oral dosing and blood sampling could also involve physically violent behaviour. Animals were often roughly handled, shaken violently and dragged down onto the floor to stop them struggling. On video at least one technician is seen hitting a monkey's head with the palm of his hand. Our investigator reported other occasions when he saw staff hit monkeys with a fist or palm on the head, face and back.