Case Western Reserve University’s medical school no longer uses live cats, dogs, and ferrets to train its surgery students, and it also will halt using pigs in lab courses, The Plain Dealer reported today. The university’s move follows similar announcements by other institutions, most recently New York Medical College. The trend is being driven by, among other factors, the availability of realistic alternatives, such as computer simulations, and pressure from students and from animal-rights groups. —Andrew Mytelka