Scientific Resources

• Animal Welfare Institute October 2021 Letter to the AVMA: Classification of Ventilation Shutdown Methods in the AVMA Guidelines for the Depopulation of Animals

• Temple Grandin March 2021: “Methods to Prevent Future Severe Animal Welfare Problems Caused by COVID-19 in the Pork Industry”

• European Food Safety Authority Panel on Animal Health and Welfare (AHAW) “Welfare of pigs during killing for purposes other than slaughter” European Food Safety Authority Journal, July 2020

• AVMA Guidelines for the Depopulation of Animals: 2019 Edition

• AVMA website “Guidelines for the depopulation of animals”

• American Association of Swine Veterinarians Recommendations for the Depopulation of Swine

• USDA Ventilation Shutdown Evidence & Policy

• World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE): Killing of Animals for Disease Control Purposes

• Evaluation of Ventilation Shutdown in a Multi-level Caged System - research study

• AVMA Guidelines for the Depopulation of Animals - Dr. Cia Johnson, Director Animal Welfare Division, American Veterinary Medical Association, from the 2019 NIAA Annual Conference: Animal Agriculture - Innovation, Technology, & Consumer Engagement, April 8 - 11, 2019, Des Moines, IA, USA.

• Using Ventilation Shutdown for Emergency Mass Depopulation of Poultry - Dr. Eric Gingerich presentation

• 22 Members of Congress Letter: Prevent Inhumane Killings of Farm Animals

• World Animal Protection (WAP) letter to AVMA urging discontinue VSD

• Letter from the Animal Welfare Institute - Environmental Assessment: High Pathogenicity Avian Influenza Control in Commercial Poultry Operations

“Consistent with published methods of mass depopulation, death should occur within 5 minutes for at least 95% of the target population. In addition, any method used should cause minimal pain and distress.”

• RSPCA Science Group Review 2008 - Ventilation shutdown judicial review - page 5

• ASPCA Statement on COVID-19-Related Depopulation of Farm Animals - May 2020

• What are the animal welfare issues with mass killing of poultry using ventilation shutdown? - RSPCA

• Zhao, Yang, Hongwei, Xin, Lihua, Li “Modelling and validating the indoor environment and supplemental heat requirement during ventilation shutdown (VSD) for rapid depopulation of hens and turkeys.” Biosystems Engineering 184(2019): 130-141.

• How ventilation shutdown works in poultry depopulation - WattAgNet - February 2016

• Ventilation Failure Alarm : 2 case studies - Evaluation of accidental VSD in pig barns - primary reference cited in AVMA Guidelines - pigs remained alive after 16 hours of VSD (Bird, N)

• Evaluating hen behavior and physiological stressors during VSD for the development of humane methodologies for mass depopulation during a disease outbreak - NC State University Research - January 2017 -

“The conclusion remains that core body temperature associated with VSD methods impacted the TOD. The time to TOD was longest for VSD followed by VSDH and VSDCO. 2. Survivor ship in the VSD does not meet the AVMA standard. Surprisingly the speed of the process and hen survivorship was similar for VSDH and VSDCO environment.” (TOD = Duration to Time of Death; VSDH = VSD + Heat; VSDCO = VSD + Carbon dioxide)

• Ventilation shutdown as suggested poultry kill method in the event of a reoccurrence of avian influenza: Letter to USDA from Compassion in World Farming - September 2015