Evan and Sharon speak out over new EU animal research Directive

3.17.00pm GMT Tue 18th Nov 2008

Sharon and Evan inspect the mice's housing conditions at MRC Harwell

After the recent publication of new EU proposals on the welfare of animal test subjects, Oxfordshire MEP Sharon Bowles and local MP Evan Harris have spoken out to back the case for well regulated medical research using animals.

On a visit to the Medical Research Council's Mary Lyon Centre at Harwell near Abingdon, an important centre for mouse research in the UK, the parliamentarians were shown how current rules are put into practice.

The MPs were shown the living conditions of the animals, and saw how the current stringent animal welfare guidelines are practiced in the UK - which is thought to be among the best countries in the world for animal welfare.

Commenting, Sharon Bowles MEP said: "The three principles of animal research have to be the '3 Rs' - reduce, refine, and replace. Ultimately we would love one day for no tests on animals to be done at all.

"Oxfordshire's own MRC Mary Lyon Centre in Harwell is a fine example of the kind of good practice we'd like to see supported by the Directive. But we have to avoid making decisions on animal welfare based on purely emotive criteria, or to end experiments where there is no suitable replacement."

Evan Harris MP added: "Animal research is needed for the sake of both human and animal health, but we have to make sure that experiments aren't duplicated unnecessarily, and that careful decisions are taken about when an animal should be anaesthatised, and humanely sacrificed."

"The UK's standards of welfare for animal research subjects are among the best in the world - and we want the rest of Europe to come up to our standards. Animal research is paying immense dividends in terms of cures to diseases that afflict both humans and animals."