Dr Hadwen Trust: Charity report highlights extreme lab animal suffering

Tuesday, 24 April 2007 12:00 AM

Government must commit to a timetable to end all animal tests

Today, on World Day for Laboratory Animals (April 24th) a new report has been launched highlighting extreme levels of animal suffering in Britain's laboratories. The report's authors, non-animal medical research charity The Dr Hadwen Trust, say the government must ban experiments causing substantial suffering (the highest level allowed by law) and commit to a targeted time-table for the total replacement of all animal experiments.

The Science Without Suffering report provides a chilling insight into the reality of life for so many animals used in UK experiments. Contrary to the impression often presented by the UK government and animal researchers, animal experiments in Britain today can still involve very high levels of suffering indeed. Science Without Suffering uses published research to shine a spotlight on these experiments and the system that permits them despite their scientific weaknesses and the extreme suffering involved.

Says Wendy Higgins, Dr Hadwen Trust:
"We believe that if the public was aware of just how much suffering animals in laboratories are allowed to experience, they would be extremely alarmed. The levels of pain and suffering our report exposes will contrast markedly with the often sanitized version of events so often presented by those who seek to perpetuate animal experiments. We believe the public deserves to know the truth and that it's time the government started taking meaningful action to stop the suffering and start a swift transmission to total replacement with non-animal techniques."

The report contains examples of British animal experiments including:
. deliberately brain damaging monkeys with chemical brain injections
. inducing lethal heart failure & intense chest pain in mice
. subjecting guinea-pigs to lethal fungal injections
. injecting rats' knees with chemicals causing ulcers and bone lesions
. forcing toxic substances down dogs' throats and
. deliberately infecting fracture wounds in sheep

The Dr Hadwen Trust believes that government assurances about animal suffering are virtually meaningless if experiments involving this much suffering are still allowed. Section 5(4) of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 (the 'cost/benefit test') says that before an animal research licensed, consideration must be given as to whether the perceived benefit of the research is outweighed by the animal suffering it would cause(3). The charity believes this system simply doesn't work.

Says Wendy Higgins:
"If the government applied the law correctly, experiments like these that involve substantial animal suffering and dubious scientific validity, should never have been licensed at all. Despite what the government may claim, animals in UK laboratories are still permitted to endure unimaginable pain and suffering in the name of science. We need root and branch reform to immediately ban this high level of suffering and implement a targeted time-table to replace all animal experiments with more modern, relevant and reliable non-animal techniques."

ENDS

Notes:
1. The Science Without Suffering report in PDF can be downloaded at www.drhadwentrust.org from April 24th
2. The relevant passage reads "In determining whether and on what terms to grant a project licence the Secretary of State shall weigh the likely adverse effects on the animal concerned against the benefit likely to accrue as a result of the programme to be specified in the licence".
3. The Dr Hadwen Trust is the UK's leading non-animal medical research charity funding vital medical research in a range of medical fields, all without animal experiments. www.drhadwentrust.org

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