Have you ever tortured a hamster? I am ashamed to admit that as a young pet owner, I once did. I was about four, maybe five years old. My friend and I put my hamster in the middle of a bed sheet we stretched out between us, and we jostled it around, lifting it up and down, catching the poor thing as it went up and down. She was okay and did not get sick, thankfully, but it was a super stupid thing to do.

The thing is, I was a little kid who didn’t know better. Cruelty was certainly not my intent. My parents were furious when they found out, and they explained that, though I liked to be tossed around like that for fun, hamsters did not. Becky—my hamster—could have been hurt. I felt awful about it and never harmed her—or any of the other hamsters I’ve had throughout my life, and there have been a few—again.

Like older-wiser-Me, the Colorado Serum Company knows better than to torture hamsters. They’re adults, see, and if they don’t know by now, they definitely shouldn’t have their own company. However, that hasn’t stopped them from injecting poor little hamsters—definitely some of my favorite animals—with deadly bacteria. Right now, CSC is using the pocket pets to test leptospirosis vaccine potency, which results in several gruesome side effects.

Each hamster’s experience with the testing can last up to five weeks. Each experience varies, though many include severely painful symptoms of blood poisoning. I remember when I had blood poisoning—my gallbladder had stopped up after producing over twenty stones—and I was definitely sick, in excruciating pain, and very itchy. Hamsters also develop painful kidney infections and damage before they die of the tests. Almost 2,000 hamsters have died as a result of this sadistic testing method.

CSC knows that there are more humane methods of testing. In fact, our own government has already approved of a safer, more humane, more reliable form of testing—and it’s been on the market for over four years! CSC simply doesn’t seem to care. In fact, the way they’re executing their experiments also violates the Animal Welfare Act.

Please write to the company today and ask that they stop these horrible experiments as soon as possible. Let them know that you think their actions are unconscionable and that more humane ways of testing vaccines exist.