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The American College of Surgeon's View of Animal Research
While the American College of Surgeons recommends animal alternatives that have proven to be equal or superior to traditional methods, the organization is on record as supporting the use of animals in education and research. Full Article
At August's Fifth World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences, a number of animal rights groups signed on to a resolution calling for the worldwide end to all medical research involving primates.
Those agreeing to the resolution included the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, Royal Society for the Protection of Cruelty to Animals, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, the Humane Society of the United States, and the German Animal Welfare Federation.
The full text of the resolution read,
Call to end the use of non-human primates in biomedical research and testing from animal protection organisations worldwide
Berlin, August 2005Non-human primates are highly intelligent, sentient animals. They form intricate social relationships, interact with their environment in a dynamic and complex way, and engage in imaginative problem solving. It is also widely accepted that primates experience a range of negative emotions (e.g. anxiety, apprehension, fear, frustration, boredom and mental stress) as well as a range of positive emotions (e.g. interest, pleasure, happiness and excitement). In short, they are very close to humans in their biology and capabilities, and the users of non-human primates argue that this makes them ideal models for research. However, this also means that primates have the capacity to suffer like humans, so there can be no question that primates can experience pain and distress.
Confining animals who would normally live in a very large and complex home range in the laboratory, must have a significant adverse effect on their welfare. At its best laboratory primate housing represents only a small fraction of their home range. The worst, still commonly used in many countries, is a small, barren metal box in which the animals can only take a few steps in any direction. Other aspects of the lifetime experience of laboratory primates also cause stress and suffering, particularly where they cannot control their environment, social grouping, or what is done to them. Any pain or distress associated with experimental procedures is therefore compounded by additional adverse effects resulting from capture of wild primates, breeding practices, transport, housing, husbandry, identification, restraint, and finally, euthanasia.
For these reasons alone, the use of primates in research and testing is a matter of extreme concern to the animal protection community worldwide and to the significant sector of the public who they represent. This concern has been recognised at a regulatory level with some countries making special provisions for primates in their legislation, and emphasising the need to reduce and replace primate experiments.
Resolution
The animal protection organisations attending the Fifth World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences in Berlin in 2005 have united to call for an end to the use of non-human primates in biomedical research and testing. We urge governments, regulators, industry, scientists and research funders worldwide to accept the need to end primate use as a legitimate and essential goal; to make achieving this goal a high priority; and to work together to facilitate this. In particular, we believe there must be an immediate, internationally co-ordinated effort to define a strategy to bring all non-human primate experiments to an end.
In a press release announcing the resolution, the Humane Society of the United States noted its objections to the continued use of non-primate species in medical research as well,
At the occasion of the World Congress, the Vice-President of the German Animal Welfare Federation (Deutscher Tierschutzbund), Dr Brigitte Rusche, the Director of Eurogroup, Sonja van Tichelen, and the Vice President for Animal Research Issues of the Humane Society of the United States, Dr Martin Stephens, also expressed concern about the continuous use of other animals in research and the slow progress in the development, validation and acceptance of non-animal alternatives. As a result in the EU alone, over 10 million animals continue to be used in experiments every year including mice and rats but also fish, pigs, goats, cats, dogs and primates.
Of course this is the same Martin Stephens who in 1999 conceded that we owe much of our advanced understanding of human biomedical knowledge to animal research.
Sources:
Worldwide call for primate testing ban. UKPets.Co.UK, August 22, 2005.
Animal Protection Organisations from Around the World Call for an End to the use of Primate Testing. Press Release, Humane Society of the United States, August 22, 2005.