Elon Musk’s Neuralink under investigation for animal welfare violations

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Elon Musk’s Neuralink under investigation for animal welfare violations

Elon Musk's Neuralink Corporation is under federal investigation for possible animal welfare violations, according to a Tuesday report from Reuters.

Neuralink, a neurotechnology company that is developing implantable computer interfaces in brains, is being looked into by the U.S. Department of Agriculture spokesman James Payne after members of the company s staff complained that Neuralink is rushing testing and causing unnecessary suffering and deaths among its animal test subjects.

According to the report, there is an investigation by the USDA about possible violations of the Animal Welfare Act, which regulates how animals are treated during research testing.

The report states that employees of Neuralink complained about a rushed testing edict from Musk, who is the company's founder and owner, which resulted in several failed tests and animal deaths, citing official company communication documents.

The report said Neuralink passed all USDA inspections of its facilities.

Musk has said last week that he believes Neuralink will implant one of its devices in a human brain within the next six months. Musk previously stated that he was pushing for human trials to begin in 2020, which he later changed to 2022, according to The Verge. The date has been moved to 2023.

Neuralink currently uses sheep, pigs, rats, mice, and monkeys for its testing, and has not been granted permission for human trials by the Food and Drug Administration. One of Neuralink s stated goals is to be able to restore brain activity for some people who suffer from spinal cord injuries, as well as cure neurological disease including Alzheimer's and dementia.

Before we would ever think of putting a device in an animal, we do everything possible with rigorous benchtop testing. Musk said at a November Neuralink event that we are not cavalier about putting these devices into animals. We are very careful and we always want the device when we do the implant - whether it is into a sheep, pig or monkey - to be confirmatory and not exploratory. Musk has been making headlines in recent months after he purchased Twitter for $44 billion. He is now CEO of Twitter, SpaceX, and Tesla TSLA.