Call For Transparency On Animal Research For World Day For Laboratory Animals, 24 April

On World Day for Laboratory Animals, 24 April, the National Anti-Vivisection Society (NAVS), joined by celebrity supporters and MPs, are calling for greater transparency and for the Freedom of Information Act to apply to animal research, currently under Government review. The NAVS Chief Executive, Jan Creamer and Campaigns Director Tim Phillips, together with actors Annette Crosbie and Brian Blessed and MPs Adrian Sanders, Caroline Lucas, Kerry McCarthy and Jim Dowd, will hand in a giant postcard and letter to the Prime Minister, signed by celebrities including Joanna Lumley, Eddie Izzard, Twiggy and Julian Clary. The NAVS is the world’s oldest and respected group working to replace the use of animals in research, and contends that the Freedom of Information Act 2000 already provides all the protection for personal information and commercial confidentiality that is needed for animal laboratories. The blanket ban on information, Section 24 of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 Amendment Regulations 2012, is not necessary. Removal of this secrecy clause would allow wider scientific and public appraisal of animal experiments. Only technical details of proposed experiments need be made available – personal details and commercially sensitive information would be protected as they are now, under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. The NAVS contention is supported by a House of Lords Select Committee and by the Government’s advisory body, the Animals in Science Committee (previously Animal Procedures Committee). Repeal of Section 24 would bring UK legislation into line with the new Government-supported European Directive on animals used in research, in which public accountability and access to information are key principles. Currently, licence applications are made in secret and awarded in secret. There is no public access to information before a licence is granted to allow wider scientific and public scrutiny of the need to use animals. Although the Home Office provides online ‘non technical summaries’ of licences that have been awarded, the debate about whether the animals should have been used takes place after the event. NAVS Chief Executive, Jan Creamer: “The public has a right to know what animals are being subjected to behind closed doors. This has been a sixteen-year wait for the Government to take action and the time has now come to end the secrecy. Informed, we can be empowered to consider scientifically advanced, humane alternatives.” Recent examples of animal research where the NAVS would have wanted to see wider scientific and public scrutiny before the animals were used, include: At Glasgow University, female hamsters suffered probes inserted into their bodies and were then given Clostridium difficile (diarrhoea causing) bacteria and antibiotics. They suffered extensive damage as a result of the infection, and were killed at 12, 24 and 36 hours later. One group were killed when they succumbed to infection after 62 hours. At St George’s, University of London, female monkeys were repeatedly dosed with an HIV protein and a gel, into their vaginas. This repetitive research was conducted in parallel with a human study and takes a scientific backward step, as it attempts to use HIV in animals to study the primate version, SHIV. There are also other studies in humans that are already further developed than primate research. At the University of Manchester, genetically engineered, visually impaired mice were made to swim to an escape platform, indicated by a light, and compared with the results from mice with normal vision, performing the same escape task. Other mice were subjected to needle probes and contact lens style electrodes in their eyes, and recordings made from their eyes and brains. This use of animals repetitive and worse was conducted alongside non-invasive research with human volunteers. At the Government’s biological warfare facility in Porton Down, Wiltshire, twenty-two marmoset monkeys were surgically implanted with probes and exposed to a bacterium, which caused deadly disease. The monkeys suffered breathlessness, rising temperatures, pneumonia and bleeding lungs. The course of the disease is known to differ between primates and humans. Similar experiments have been carried out since 1925 and the justification for using these intelligent, emotional and sensitive primates was their small size, allowing “ethical, safe housing within biocontaminent restraints, as well as their low cost and availability”. 10 Downing Street Launch The campaign will officially be launched on Wednesday 24 April – World Day for Laboratory Animals – at 1.30pm when actors Annette Crosbie and Brian Blessed, joined by NAVS Chief Executive Jan Creamer, Campaigns Director Tim Phillips and MPs Adrian Sanders, Caroline Lucas, Kerry McCarthy and Jim Dowd, will hand in a giant postcard to Downing Street, signed by celebrities including Joanna Lumley, Eddie Izzard, Twiggy and Julian Clary.

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