- 25
- MAR
Posted by Cat under blog's category : Animal welfare & alternatives
If there is one thing that anti-vivisection campaigns are good at, it's providing vivid imagery. Unfortunately, the striking images they use can often be inaccurate, out of date, or obtained from countries where animal welfare takes very low priority. That's why at Understanding Animal Research, we think it's important to set the record straight, and provide images and video that show what animal facilities really look like.
As we all know, good practice in animal research and the 3Rs - refinement, replacement and reduction of the use of animals in research - go hand in hand. What's more, the progress and investment that animal researchers are making in implementing the 3Rs is a clear indication of the level of care that research facilities take to improve the welfare of their animals.
With all this in mind, Understanding Animal Research has a new video project underway. We've been asking research facilities to open their doors to our staff and our video camera, and show us the different ways that their staff are implementing the 3Rs in their work. We've been delighted with the response so far, and we are busy right now cutting the footage together and continuing filming in ever more locations.
Some of the films will be used as an educational resource on our website, and be taken into schools. We hope it will be an interactive and tangible way to communicate the 3Rs - a topic which can be difficult to explain - as well as providing real, accurate footage of what animal facilities and animal procedures really look like.
In the meantime, if you are interested in obtaining recent video clips and images from UK animal research facilities, take a look at what we already have available in our online libraries.
And of course, if you would like to take part in our 3Rs video project, please let us know. Contact Cat de Lange on cdelange@uar.org.uk
IMAGE©iSTOCKPHOTO/nicolas hansen
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Thanks Bagpuss. We agree, those exposes are a real blow for the vast majority of facilities, which have fantastic standards. This is part of the thinking behind the video project. I'm glad you like the clips we have up already, but as you say, we need to show more examples of procedures, as well as just the housing facilities. We've had a really fantastic response to this project, and some of the video we are shooting at the moment will show examples of simple procedures - so watch this space.
These are wonderful videos which should certainly help redress the balance when compared with the images put out by anti-vivisection organisations. Hopefully, all facilities will reach such standards and we won't have any more embarassing exposes of sub-standard facilities.
What worries me though is that the most dreadful images used by the anti-vivs show animals during procedures or after preparation as models of disease. I doubt if scientists would want to show equivalent pictures, but if you do not include such images in education materials could you not lay yourselves open to the suggestion of bias?