Screen Prince of Darkness Christopher Lee knows a thing or two about terror and torture! The horror film legend took time off from filming the next Star Wars movie to record a new PETA radio spot, in which he tells listeners, "When you donate money to the American Heart Association, you help fund cruel, pointless experiments on animals. Please don't support any charity that kills.

What has the American Heart Association (AHA) done with donors' funds? Despite the fact that major advances in studying heart disease have come from human data, the American Heart Association has:

* injected particles of glass into dogs' hearts to induce heart failure.
* given dogs a mini-heart attack every two minutes for eight hours a day for three weeks.
* shocked dogs' hearts for 30 minutes straight in order to cause blood clots.
* given newborn pigs brain injuries by using pendulums to strike metal shafts inserted into their skulls.
* implanted electrodes into 2-week-old lambs' hearts and heads, then kept them in cages so small they couldn't turn around or move forward or backward.

The American Heart Association funded these and more gruesome experiments, even though cruelty-free and more sophisticated and species-specific research methods exist. For example, the Framingham Heart Study followed 7,000 people over 50 years and proved the connection between high cholesterol and heart attacks. Other studies, such as the Lipid Research Clinic's Trial and the Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial, have also demonstrated the importance of controlling cholesterol levels.

However, if the AHA is dead set on using dogs, a virtual dog heart, available from Physiome Sciences, can precisely simulate the electrical activities of individual cells and show how they are affected by chemicals and arrhythmia. Simulations like these help researchers test drugs without harming animals and can mimic exactly some of the experiments done by the American Heart Association.

As Christopher Lee says, "Your contribution should help end sufferingnot cause it."

What You Can Do

* The next time the American Heart Association asks you for a donation, send the organization a clear message: You won't give until you've been assured that your donation will be used to help people--without harming animals.

* Contact the president of the American Heart Association, and tell her that you will donate only to health charities that do not fund any animal experiments. Contact:

Rosemary Robertson, President
American Heart Association
7272 Greenville Ave.
Dallas, TX 75231-4596
214-373-6300
Email: gails@heart.org