The UBC/animal research debacle continues this past week with an article in the Georgia Strait.
I am cautiously supportive. Even though I believe that animal research is sometimes justified (AFTER exhaustive tissue culture testing and AFTER we understand a certain system well and ONLY IF the people using the animals are well trained in both methodology and ethics… which doesn’t happen nearly enough…)
I think that any amount of attention towards the welfare of animal research is a good thing. 🙂
I used to work in animal research, as I’ve mentioned before. A lot of things convinced me to change careers, and this was one of them.
One of the turning points for me was a biomedical ethics course I took at UBC. I took this class after I had been out of school and working in biomedical research for a few years. Initially, I only took it because I thought it would be an easy class. But in the end, it really opened my eyes. Even though the class focused on human biomedical ethical decisions, much of the underlying theory can be applied to research animal ethics. And I realized then, that a lot of biomedical research cannot be justified morally. Some, yes. But not all.
For example, one underlying idea in moral philosophy and ethics is the idea of “use”. Do we have a right to “use” another creature for our own purposes? Many would argue yes from a utilitarian perspective – the argument of “the greater good”. But even while “using” we have responsibilities.
The Canadian Council for Animal Care recognizes animals as sentient – in other words, capable of feeling, capable of pain. Of suffering. There are good guidelines in place in this book. And yet, they are not mandatory. And yet, UBC continues to let researchers with foreign credentials do research on mice with standards that are unacceptable in North America. There are labs which refuse to give animals the proper pain medications or use proper, sterilized instruments. Veterinarians are handcuffed by institutional rules which do not allow them to conduct surprise visits on animal facilities. Technicians who care for the animals are overworked and under-educated, and not allowed the time to train properly.
So what would I tell UBC?
Teach your technicians and students and staff how to use and care for animals so that we do not use more than necessary. Stop allowing PIs to coerce grad students into to use mice just so that they can get their name on another publication. And give the public the means to shut down those labs who violate the standards of animal care in North America.
AlbinoMouse 
For all the best intentions, you miss the vital fact that there are literally 1000’s of doctors and leading scientists worldwide who hold that each species is a specific entity unto its own, and to attempt to simulate and ‘cure’ the disease of one species in any other is not only morally reprehensible but wrong-headed and sheer bad science.
“I abhor animal experimentation. It should be abolished. I know of no breakthrough, no scientific achievement, which could not have been accomplished without such barbarism and cruelty. The whole thing is evil.”
Dr. Charles Mayo, co- founder of the Mayo Clinic, NY Daily News, 3/21/64
If you are going to go up against what Dr.Suzuki calls ‘a very entrenched profession”, you need to weigh the argument for the total abolition of animal research…..
Hi Anne, thanks for your comment.
For me, I am not sure of how biomedical research into drugs and therapy can continue without some degree of animal research. I think that all other avenues should be pursued first, including tissue culture, computer simulation and voluntary clinical study enrollment, but at some point, scientists need to use animals in order to comply with (1) current drug and health regulations and (2) to get published. It’s an interesting cycle of dependency and because of that dependency (of publishing, getting grants, getting government approval) I’m not sure that abolishing animal use outright would get enough support from all the different groups affected.
More concerning to me is the numbers of animals which are bred and not used at all – to create and then to kill because they weren’t “needed” – and also the numbers of animals used in redundant studies
of little value – studies like, categorizing the amount of pain an animal feels or studies which continue to examine the negative effects of smoking.
That’s one of the reasons why I argue for “small steps”. First to improve current animal studies and care to minimize the number of animals used, and secondly, to remove those labs that violate current animal care standards and NOT allow them to continue to receive funding. But as I said, I think ANY and ALL attention on animal research is good because it will bring about positive change in the long run.
Total and immediate abolition is the surest way to save lives, both animal and human.