6th February 2008 | PRESS RELEASE: Sussex University Students Challenge


University and Home Office over Animal Experiments
Wednesday 6th February 2008
For immediate release
For more information or further comment please contact:
Naomi Scott,  violencefreescience@yahoo.com
07521 722 857


Sussex University Students Challenge University and Home Office over Animal Experiments

In the first case of its kind at the University of Sussex, a detailed examination and report into live experiments on animals has taken place and is now available in the public domain. Sussex University – Challenged, an 18-page report compiled by students and several scientific professionals, is available online to download by clicking on the link below:

 http://www.violencefreescience.org/main/SussexUniversityChallenged01.pdf
[PDF document - approx 10min download time].

After months of extensive research using over 50 of Sussex University’s research papers, six were selected for detailed examination by Molecular Biochemist Colleen McDuling BSc(Hons) MSc(Med.Sc.), with kind assistance from Senior Research Scientist Jonathan Balcombe PhD.

The experiments, all of which took place within the past few years, have thrown into light the questionable validity of using animals in these procedures. In addition, it is questionable whether the Home Office should have even issued licenses for such experiments when alternative methods were quite clearly available and more reliable to use.

As the report clearly demonstrates, use of animals was not required in each case; there were other scientific methods that could have been used, all of which are explained in detail within the document. In fact, the report goes on to point out that the use of animals in these experiments was actually detrimental to the accumulation of relevant scientific data, having only produced somewhat unsteady evaluations that can only be loosely applied to the species that were involved in the experiment. Furthermore, as outlined in more detail later, the licenses for animal-based studies can only be issued by the Home Office on the basis that no alternatives could’ve been used – something which is clearly not the case in these examples.

While the University continues to maintain that these procedures “cannot be done without the use of live animals”, this small selection of exemplary papers proves otherwise. In one example, the University’s testing of alcohol withdrawal on animals proved to entirely pointless and misleading, especially considering “other technology, such as PET scans and Functional MRI could be used to monitor brain activity” [1].

Other experiments were equally bizarre, ranging from force-feeing rats to the point of obesity [2] and inserting electrodes into the brains of baby wild caught bats [3]. This is all despite having access to a vast number of local resources, where human volunteers studies could’ve taken place in an environment that is both relevant and useful to the study. Again, these experiments had much more reliable alternatives which should have been used, such as those previously mentioned. Yet licenses were still granted by the Home Office for these experiments, and lavish research grants issued from drug multinationals and so-called research “charities” – at the cost of the British Taxpayer.

As a result of these findings, students and scientists are also challenging the Home Office to justify why project licenses have been issued for the University to carry out such experiments. It is a legal requirement that alternatives should be used when available – and alternatives were indeed available for the tests. Therefore the relevant licenses for such experiments should not have been issued in the first place.

Within the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, section 2.3 of Chapter two details that “regulated procedures can only be authorised and performed if there are no scientifically suitable alternatives”. Furthermore, the Act goes on to specify, “authorities cannot be granted when appropriate replacement, reduction and refinement alternatives are reasonably and practicably available” (section 2.45).

As demonstrated in Sussex University – Challenged, there were alternative non-animal experimental methods available that could have been used in place of live animals. There were indeed “scientifically suitable alternatives” and alternatives were indeed “practically available”. This is not only apparent for the six papers examined in detail, but for all those looked at.

Students and scientists are now openly challenging both University and Home Office officials to justify why such licenses were issued to experiment on live animals when it was so clearly not required, and why such experiments are still taking place despite the large availability to use more reliable scientific methods.


ENDS


References
[1] McDuling, C (2008), Sussex University – Challenged, page 4.

[2] The cannabinoid CB1 receptor inverse agonist, rimonabant, modifies body weight and adiponectin function in diet-induced obese rats as a consequence of reduced food intake; Pharmacology, Biochemistry and Behaviour; 84: 353-359

[3] The development of a single frequency place in the mammalian cochlea: the cochlear resonance in the mustached bat Pteronotus parnellii; The Journal of Neuroscience 23(34):10971-10981