- 02
- NOV
Posted by Zebedee under blog's category : Antivivisection & extremism
The recent infiltration of a UK safety testing facility by an antivivisectionist raises many questions. According to a report in The Sunday Times, animals are being used to test ‘botox’ for cosmetic purposes, the law is being flouted and animal welfare practices are poor. But can these allegations be substantiated?
UAR does not condone bad practice in animal research, and the video footage certainly does not give a good impression. However, no-one should accept trial by media sensationalism. Nor can we accept the word of antivivisectionist groups – who are far from impartial. The British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV) has a long history of making claims following infiltrations which do not stand up to scrutiny. The Home Office will need to investigate thoroughly these claims and the company concerned must be given the opportunity to put their case. If animal welfare has been compromised or the law has been broken, then the company will face the consequences.
Questions that need to be answered include: why do the rabbits appear to be housed singly in small barren cages, when normally rabbits are housed in groups with plenty of environmental enrichment including toys, thing to gnaw and nesting material? Are all procedures carried out properly under licence? Why were mice apparently killed on the floor?If the infiltrator discovered malpractice, why did they stand by and film it over eight months instead of reporting it to the authorities? Did they contribute to it, as infiltrators working for antivivisection groups have seemingly done in the past? ('Spy' for animal rights under fire, Observer 26 March 2000).
There are also several facts that are inconvenient for BUAV and The Sunday Times, so they have chosen not to mention them. Such an unbalanced approach undoubtedly clouds the picture for the public, so for the sake of balance we present a few of the facts here.
Botulinum toxin has many important medical applications. It is a potent neurotoxin used to treat several conditions including cerebral palsy – which affects one in 400 children born in the UK. It is also used to treat some of the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, dystonias and severe facial tics. The Home Office does not issue any licences for the testing of 'botox' as a cosmetic in the UK; if the toxin was merely used for cosmetic purposes, testing on animals would not be allowed under the law.
The potency of each batch of botulinum toxin needs to be tested before it can be used to treat patients. This test still requires mice: the mouse potency bioassay, although less severe tests are being developed. Similarly, pyrogenicity tests on rabbits are still required in certain circumstances, although recent alternatives including tests that use crab and human blood have gone a long way to replacing them.
Dislocation of the neck is an accepted and humane way of killing laboratory mice. Death is instant. We do not see mice ‘writhing’, but twitching, which is a reflex after death.
Thorough investigation of all BUAV’s allegations, some of which are quite technical, will no doubt take considerable time, even if the Home Office starts immediately. Unfortunately the outcome is unlikely to be reported as prominently as the original allegations.
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Comments
While allegations of bad practice must always be investigated, this doesn't change the essential argument. Animal research remains an essential component of medical research.
Video 'evidence' can be edited, spun and manipulated to present the 'truth' as required. It will take a thorough investigation by non-partial bodies to uncover the facts here. In the meantime, we should not be relying on BUAV to give us direction on medical research. Their aims have nothing to do with advancing medicine.
It's very problematic: did the infiltrator make no false statements, commit no fraud, in order to get in, so as to make the allegations? We live in an age where there's a move to prosecute parents who gild the lily a bit in order to secure a school place for their offspring, at what point does it become alright to fake an ID and work record in order to get a job with a company, especially with a pre-determined objective of finding trouble rather than being open-minded?
Such infiltration would lead to prosecution at an airport, if ever detected. We have even seen people joining the police and the armed forces under false identities in order, usually, to expose racism. The police shouldn't be racist, but neither should it be possible to get in to any uniformed service on a false ID!
Medawar doesn't favour ID cards, because it's pretty obvious that the checks involved in issuing them are not going to work, if journalists can get themselves taken on as probationary constables and the like, where any and all possible checks ought to be undertaken.
The problem is that the barrage of meaningless and all-pervasive 'checks' instigated by government, does indeed switch people's brains off to the point where nobody is thinking or noticing anything anymore. This must make life easier for serious terrorist groups as well as the BUAV.
The S Times article is very sloppy; while there are some in vitro methods that can be used to evaluate botulinum toxin they only measure some of the activities of the toxin. The endopeptidase assay that is used by the National Institute for Biological Standards and Control only examines one activity of the toxin so while it has reduced the number of mice that need to be used it has not replaced them entirely.
Finding a replacement for the mouse LD50 test for botulinum toxin has been a priority for several agencies involved in 3Rs work for the past decade and there has been a lot of work done, nevertheless a report published by the ICCVAM-NICEATM/ECVAM Scientific Workshop on Alternative Methods to Refine, Reduce or Replace the Mouse LD50 Assay for Botulinum Toxin Testing in 2008 concluded that:
'...none of these methods can currently be considered a complete replacement for the mouse LD50 assay, either for detection of BoNT or for potency determination. The panel noted that, with additional development and validation efforts, some of the methods might serve as a replacement for the mouse LD50 assay in the future.'
I'm disappointed by The S Times; this piece is reminiscent of the bad journalism that played a major role in the bogus MMR scare story a few years back.