A medical company founded by Elon Musk is under investigation for potential welfare violations – with a total of 1,500 animals dead in four years, according to a report.
Neuralink staff have filed internal complaints that animal testing is being rushed, causing unnecessary suffering and deaths, Reuters said.
Documents seen by the news agency said 280 sheep, pigs and monkeys have died as a result of experiments since 2018.
Read more: Elon Musk’s Neuralink puts computer chips in pigs’ brains
Musk talks about the 2018 launch of Neuralink. Photo: AP
Neuralink is developing a brain implant it hopes will help paralyzed people walk again and treat other neurological problems.
Complaints made by staff say Musk has increased pressure to speed up development, leading to botched experiments that need to be repeated.
In one case, 25 pigs were reportedly implanted with the wrong sized devices – with a source telling Reuters it was a mistake that could have been avoided with more preparation.
Earlier this year, a Neuralink executive reportedly sent staff an article about Swiss researchers who developed an electrical implant that helped a man walk again.
She wrote, “Overall, we’re just not moving fast enough. It’s driving me nuts!”
Reuters also said that, on several occasions, Musk told employees to imagine having a bomb strapped to their head in an attempt to make them move faster.
The total number of dead animals does not necessarily indicate that Neuralink is violating regulations or standard research practices.
Many companies routinely use animals in experiments to advance human health care and face financial pressures to get products to market quickly.
Animals are typically killed when experiments are completed, often so they can be examined post-mortem for research purposes.
But current and former Neuralink employees say the number of pet deaths is higher than it should be.
The San Francisco-based firm had sought approval from the US Food and Drug Administration for the Neuralink project, which saw scientists develop a tiny implant with more than 3,000 electrodes, connected to flexible wires measuring about one-tenth the size of a hair, and can monitor about 1,000 neurons.
At the time of its launch, Musk said they had three pigs with two coin-sized implants each, and described them as “healthy, happy and indistinguishable from a normal pig.”
The alleged problems highlighted with Neuralink’s tests have raised questions about the quality of the data generated by the experiments and this could potentially delay attempts to start trials in humans.
But some employees interviewed by Reuters said the company treated animals quite well compared to other research facilities, with animals let loose in what has been likened to a “Monkey Disneyland”.
A former Neuralink staffer recalled Musk saying he didn’t like using animals for research, but wanted to make sure they were “the happiest animals” while they were alive.
Musk and other Neuralink executives did not respond to Reuters requests for comment.
