Wearing pig masks and “bloody” hospital gowns and holding signs that read, “Use Simulators, Not Pigs,” PETA supporters will rally inside Oregon Health & Science University’s (OHSU) board of directors meeting tomorrow, urging the school to end its invasive procedures on live pigs in its obstetrics and gynecology (OB/GYN) physician residency training program.

When:    Thursday, January 25, 9:30 a.m.

Where:    Robertson Life Sciences Building, Room 3A001, 3rd Fl., 2730 S. Moody Ave., Portland

PETA supporters urge OHSU’s board of directors to end pig mutilations during a previous protest. Credit: PETA

“Smart and sensitive pigs are cut open and mutilated while they’re still alive for these cruel and pointless OB/GYN training drills at OHSU,” says PETA Vice President Shalin Gala. “PETA is calling on OHSU to adopt superior, non-animal technology—as other OB/GYN residency training programs have already done—that benefits physicians and patients without harming pigs.”

Records obtained by PETA show that at least 64 OB/GYN residents at OHSU have cut into up to 48 live female pigs, dissected their organs, and performed other invasive surgeries on them in attempts to learn human medicine. All the animals were later killed.

Along with taking other actions, PETA sent a letter to Dr. Amy Stenson, director of the university’s OB/GYN residency program, and wrote to Dr. Aaron Caughey, the school’s OB/GYN department chair, noting that dozens of similar programs in the U.S. use animal-free training methods, such as realistic human-patient simulators, advanced virtual reality systems, and interactive computer models.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview.

For more information, please visit PETA.org, listen to The PETA Podcast, or follow the group on X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, or Instagram.