Whether you're a vegetarian/vegan or not, I must say most people do have a fondness for animals. Which unfortunately doesn't seem to extent to a great majority of places that still do animal testings. On animals you would have in your homes, not just the proverbial "lab rats". Dogs, cats, horses... no animal is too cute or cudly for those who do these horrific deeds.

I just saw a program on the rescue of a chimp, he had been in captivity for over 20 years. He was chained and abused, a circus chimp I think he was. He was castrated and had very few teeth left, they were pulled out when they captured him. The program led me to look up the site of the people who saw to his rescue. I have seen images like these before, and they have the same effect time and again. But one can forget that this occurs on a daily basis. It's good to be reminded again.


The NAVS was the first organisation to ever undertake an undercover investigation of an animal laboratory - as long as 1902. In 1984, we revived the tactic with an investigation of Toxicol Laboratories, Herefordshire, UK, and since then the investigative work of the NAVS and our sister group, the Animal Defenders, has become the standard by which undercover investigations are judged. Many organisations have followed this important lead, indeed, our Special Investigations Department has been called on to brief and instruct campaigners throughout the world.

Evidence collected by the NAVS inside British Laboratories, for example, provides the widest and most accurate picture available of life and death for lab animals.

We were the first organisation to expose contract testing on animals; to film primates in brain research; to expose the overbreeding of animals; and the only organisation whose investigative work has led to a laboratory licence to experiment being revoked.

Our video, 'Unlock the Labs', contains footage from these investigations. To order a copy, please click here. Everything featured in this video and outlined here was licensed and inspected by the Home Office and yet even your Member of Parliament would not have known about it, but for the NAVS.

Establishments investigated include:
SmithKline Beecham, Essex; St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School, London; St Mary's Hospital Medical School, London; Toxicol (now Quintiles) Laboratories, Herefordshire; Charing Cross & Westminster Medical School, London; The Institute of Neurology, London, Oxford University; and lab breeders Harlan and Hylyne (the latter is now closed).

Our investigations show day to day life in UK laboratories:
the casual killing of unwanted animals - our investigations produced the first hard evidence of massive killing of unwanted animals;
the miserable confinement and poor husbandry;
labs routinely ignoring Government codes of practice;
the brutal and unnecessary experiments.



Overbreeding
Laboratory Animal Housing
Wild-Caught Animals
'Rigorous' Controls?
Futile attempts to replicate human conditions in animals
Animals Used When A Non-Animal Method Is Available
Experiments When The Outcome Is Known
Unreliable, Unethical, Unnecessary
The NAVS Takes You Inside The UK's Secret Laboratories
The NAVS Special Investigations Department penetrates the secret world of animal research, with elaborate and extensive undercover investigations. Our photographs and video have shown people what really goes on behind the laboratory doors

Institute of Neurology, London (Access Denied Report)

Macaque monkeys in small barren cages; a monkey with metal bolts and plates permanently implanted in her head; cats used in migraine experiments; rats used in drug experiments

Charing Cross & Westminster Medical School, London (Access Denied Report)

As a result of the NAVS investigation, the licence for this laboratory was suspended, and all staff re-trained in humane killing procedures. We had uncovered sloppy killing procedures and huge quantities of animals slaughtered simply because they were surplus to requirements. the laboratory's own killing statistics, combined with those we had exposed in other laboratories revealed for the first time, hard evidence of massive overbreeding of laboratory animals. This lab conducted experiments on cats, dogs, guinea pigs, mice, sheep and pigs, including deliberately inducing heart failure in dogs

John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford University

Laboratory technicians laughing as they smash live mice against bench tops to kill them; rabbit's legs fractured and stretched; heart experiments on sheep

St. Mary's Hospital Medical School, London (Labs Unlocked Report)

Tamarin monkeys injected with excrement in hepatitis experiments and kept in cages breaking government guidelines. Rats with electrodes permanently bolted into their heads

Toxicol Laboratories, Ledbury, Herefordshire (Labs Unlocked Report)

Beagle puppies being used in tests for commercial companies, including being fed a weedkiller which had already been tested, and had been on the market for years

St. Bartholomew's Hospital, London (Vivisection in Britain Report)

Shocking arthritis and multiple sclerosis experiments on animals, funded by top charities

SmithKline Beecham, Stock, Essex (Vivisection in Britain Report)

Experiments on rats and beagle dogs

Interfauna, Cambridgeshire, lab animal supplier

In an elaborate sting, six beagle puppies were saved by the NAVS from being sold for experiments by this international lab dealer; film was taken of the breeding areas


(live links on the site. You can see the visuals, I imagine they are beyond shocking. http://www.navs.org.uk/vivisection/inside/ )

Well that kind of thing is wholly unnecessary. Its good that there are organizations that keep a close eye on these places. Yet another thing lottery money should be used for.

Some rescue cases.

Two lions rescued from a circus by the Animal Defenders International, the morning after they were released into a 12 hectare enclosure of natural bush in South Africa. Before their rescue they had known only misery and small cages with the circus.


One of five dogs rescued by Animal Defenders International from the Akef Egyptian Circus in Mozambique. The dogs which had lived in a small cage with the circus we rehomed in South Africa.


In an elaborate sting, the NAVS rescued six beagle puppies from international lab animal dealer Interfauna in Cambridgeshire. After being reared in concrete pens, our picture shows the beagles' first night of comfort with the NAVS.


This tiny capuchin monkey is an incredible survivor. In horrific neurology experiments in Chile he was retrained and had electrodes and probes implanted in his brain. His release from the laboratory was secured by the efforts of the NAVS and Centro de Rehabilitación de Primates. This picture shows Darwin on his first day in an enclosure, paid for by NAVS supporters, where he has trees and the companionship of other monkeys at Centro de
This tiny capuchin monkey is an incredible survivor. In horrific neurology experiments in Chile he was retrained and had electrodes and probes implanted in his brain. His release from the laboratory was secured by the efforts of the NAVS and Centro de Rehabilitación de Primates. This picture shows Darwin on his first day in an enclosure, paid for by NAVS supporters, where he has trees and the companionship of other monkeys at Centro de Rehabilitación de Primates.


Toto the chimpanzee toured South America for 20 years living in a packing crate with a Circus Konig. He was rescued in 2003 in a joint operation by ADI, Centro de Rehabilitación de Primates, and the Chilean Ministry SAG. Here Toto gets his first check up with our rescue team before starting his new life.

Awwwww

It is, it's just sad and an incredibly unevolved method of treating any sentient creature. The sick fact is, it's mostly unnecessary. The fact that they still test age old products, which chemical compounds have remaind the same can only be described as sadistic. There is no logical reason for it. I have also posted on a thread in News about the alternatives to animal testings in a related article.

"Vivisection is the blackest of all the black crimes that man is at present committing against God and his fair creation. It ill becomes us to invoke in our daily prayers the blessings of God, the Compassionate, if we in turn will not practice elementary compassion towards our fellow creatures." Mahatma Gandhi


http://www.navs.org.uk/vivisection/whatis/

"What is vivisection?
Vivisection literally means the cutting up of a live animal; however dictionary definitions have been revised in over the years, and this term has become a general label for all types of animal experiments.


"Vivisection" and "experiments" were thus used in an interchangeable way until the mid 1980s, in addition to "procedures" described in scientific literature. Then, when the Government revised the legislation on animal experiments in 1986, a new formal description was introduced into the legislation, "procedures". This term can be used to cover both scientific procedures on animals which are not strictly an experiment, as well as experiments. The reason for the different terminology is that an experiment is usually defined as something where the outcome, or effects on the animal, would not be known whereas a "procedure" takes in all of those uses of animals where the outcome/effect on the animal can be predicted, for example toxicity testing, breeding animals with a harmful genetic defect, production of antisera, maintenance of tumours, etc.

This description is used in the UK legislation - the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 - and government officials, those involved in the industry, etc.

In secret, inside the world's laboratories, animals are burnt, blinded, mutilated; their limbs are deliberately broken; they are force-fed products; noxious chemicals dripped into their eyes; irradiated; deliberately infected with disease, and more.

Yet these experiments can never be trusted. The fundamental flaw of animal-based research is that each species responds differently to drugs and chemicals, therefore results from animal tests are unreliable as a means of predicting likely effects in humans. Thus, animal experiments are unreliable, unethical, and unnecessary.

Nevertheless, animals suffer and die to test products used in the home, at work, in the car, in the garden and personal body care products. They are used in biological, chemical, and ballistic warfare testing. The United Kingdom's Porton Down 'defence' centre tests weapons on animals - almost every country in the world has some kind of similar weapons programme, which they develop on animals.
Animals are used in space programmes - terrified animals were shot into space before people; tests previously conducted on Earth are repeated in space to see the difference.
Animals are subjected to deep sea pressure and raised quickly to the surface to suffer decompression sickness ('the bends').
They are used to develop crude surgical procedures, despite the differences between the species.
Their bones are broken to see how they mend.
Animals skulls are drilled open and hardware inserted so that the function of their brains can be recorded.
Baby animals are deprived of their mothers to see what effect it has on them in later life.
Animals are used to develop and test pharmaceutical products - both medical and 'pseudomedical' products - for example illicit (recreational) drugs, slimming drugs, or, a pharmaceutical company's new, improved, drug which might in fact be introduced to the market simply to improve sales. Of the 20-30,000 pharmaceutical products on the market today, the World Health Organisation has listed only 250 as being necessary for human health programmes.
In the UK, over 2.5 million procedures take place on animals every year. NAVS investigations have also revealed that there is a high level of wastage in the UKs animal labs - for every animal used, around 3 animals have been reared only to be killed because they are surplus to requirements.

Consistent and reliable records are not kept worldwide, but it is estimated that as many as 150 million animals are used globally, every year."

Holy fucking shit!

i'll agree with you on this topic...it's cruel when companies do it, but also sad that there are pet owners who have little more regard for that cute animal they took home...survival is one thing, cruelty is a whole different realm of outrage.

That's well said, and the unfortunate thing is it is so incredibly vast. I remember our session on my vegetarian thread, this of course invokes the same sentiments in me but it is an entirely different topic, in the sense that like I said before, you don't have to be vegetarian to oppose this. For the most part, the general public is oblivious to these horrors, and I feel it is important to bring awareness. Instead of saying "CARE about the lot of these animals" I am just saying "LOOK at the lot of these animals" and then choose whether you want to care or not. That entire vegetarian argument taught me a lot about respecting personal choices. It's easy to become self-righteous about one own's sense of morality, but there is only one way to understand something, and that is to experience it. Therefore I realize you cannot judge personal choices.

But even in the light of that I see no rational or necessary reason as to why mankind can in good conscience do what still gets done today. The thing is it is SO fucking huge one can simply feel helpless in the face of it and thus give in so to speak. But awareness can go a long way and the smallest of contributions can too. There are many products out there that are animal friendly and have not been tested on animals, and they're not always the most expensive either. I don't believe things will change until WE change them. These people cannot continue forever with their barbaric brutality if we refuse to support it. There are ways and means in which to show support, but I do realize it can be time consuming. It means one needs to fully understand the realities, which means you have to spend extra time educating yourself about these truths. And it's not always a luxury many people have. The least I suppose is to just become aware, and when the choice to buy one product that has been tested on animals and one that doesn't is all that one can for the time being I feel it's at least giving one clear message! I try and buy as many of these products as I can.

I can only wish for a time where there were more choices, and I wish for a time when our governments could have a bit of compassion and display a human characteristic so often neglected, Empathy, and step in and put an end to these horrific deeds. If animal friendly products were cheaper we'd be saving so many lives.

I've found some online petitions, I'll post them all and ask that if you feel moved at all by the plight of animals to sign one or all of them. Thank you.

The first one:

STOP HUNTINGDON LIFE SCIENCES, Europe's largest vivisection lab.

http://www.gopetition.com/sign.php?c...237&petid=1241

http://www.animalrightsagenda.com/petitions.html

This one has a huge list of links of petitions, choose any you may wish to contribute to. Thank you!

signed

Thank you!!

Pledge to Boycott Procter & Gamble Products Until They Cease Testing On Animals

http://www.ethical-business.com/?sect=sign&pet=111

Cruelty towards Bears
http://www.gopetition.com/sign.php?c...n=237&petid=50


Ban dog meat and cat soup in Korea
http://www.gopetition.com/sign.php?c...=112&petid=160


STOP THE TORTURE TO DOGS AND CATS IN SOUTH KOREA
http://www.gopetition.com/sign.php?c...=237&petid=420


STOP ANIMAL TESTING NOW!!
http://www.gopetition.com/sign.php?c...238&petid=3459


Stop Battery Chicken Suffering in the UK
http://www.gopetition.com/sign.php?c...222&petid=3508


Don't Eat at KFC!!!!!
http://www.gopetition.com/sign.php?c...238&petid=3548

I demand the immediate cessation of seal hunting in Canada
http://www.fondationbrigittebardot.f...ormulaire.html


WITHOUT FUR BECAUSE I WANT IT SO !
http://gopetition.com/sign.php?curre...n=72&petid=509




A site giving you information on cruelty free shopping:
http://www.crueltyfreeshop.com/



A radical, eye opening site:
http://www.stopeuchemicaltests.com/index3.html

The following is a brief overview of some new test methods that should be used in the EU chemical-testing programme to reduce or eliminate animal use:

Acute (short-term) toxicity can be studied using cell culture (in vitro) systems, since the actions of toxic chemicals are often focused at the cellular level. For example, a series of four cell culture tests can predict toxicity in humans with nearly 85 per cent accuracy (compared to 65 per cent in acute toxicity studies using animals). This method should, within several years, be able to replace the horrendously cruel use of animals in acute lethal poisoning testing.

Skin irritation testing can be carried out without any animal use, with the aid of human volunteers who agree to participate in brief and non-invasive ‘skin patch’ tests. Testing for irreversible skin irritation (corrosion) can also be carried out using such widely accepted non-animal methods as CORROSITEX™, EPIDERM™ and the EPISKIN™ reconstituted human skin test. The rate of chemical absorption through the skin can also be modelled in cell culture using human skin from cadavers. The above methods are all largely accepted by government regulators internationally and should be used as total replacements for skin irritation, corrosion and absorption testing in animals.

Eye irritation testing is almost identical to skin irritation testing, i.e., a chemical that is a skin irritant will also be an eye irritant. (One would fucking think it'd be obvious to these highly educated scientists.) Therefore, eye irritation testing in animals should be discontinued immediately. Government regulators should instead use the results of non-animal skin irritation or corrosion tests to predict potential eye irritancy.

Skin sensitisation cannot, as yet, be studied using strictly non-animal methods. However, a less-invasive test method that also reduces the number of animals used (called the Local Lymph Node Assay) has been developed and should be used in place of the current Guinea Pig Maximisation Test.

Repeated dose toxicity can be studied using cells cultured from different body tissues to estimate the effects of a chemical on different organ systems. For example, human liver cells in culture could be exposed to repeated low doses of a chemical in order to study how the substance is broken down (metabolised) by the body and to identify any toxic byproducts (metabolites) that may be produced in the process. Stable human cell cultures have been produced for kidney, nervous, immune, reproductive and other essential organ systems. A ‘tiered’ testing strategy that combines several of these tissues in culture with the use of computer and mathematical modelling has the potential to do away with animal use in repeated-dose toxicity studies.

Genetic toxicity (mutagenicity) can be studied entirely without the use of animals. Three methods in particular (the Bacterial Reverse Mutation Test, In Vitro Cell Gene Mutation Test and the In Vitro Chromosomal Aberration Test) have been accepted by government regulators worldwide as valid alternatives to using animals. Therefore, genetic toxicity testing in animals should be discontinued immediately.

Reproductive toxicity and certain aspects of male and female reproductive function can be modelled to some extent in vitro, and several cellular components of reproductive organs can be maintained in cell cultures. Although no test method has yet been used or validated for routine use in reproductive toxicity studies, it is possible that a battery of such systems may in the future be able to model a large proportion of the male and female reproductive cycles, thereby reducing or replacing animal use in reproductive toxicity testing.

Developmental toxicity (teratogenicity) can be studied in cell cultures using an embryonic stem cell test, which is currently being validated as a screen for birth defects. Preliminary reports indicate that the in vitro embryonic stem cell test can predict toxicity in humans with greater than 80 per cent accuracy. It is hoped that within several years, this method will be able to eliminate animal use in developmental toxicity testing.

More generally, the following computer-based modelling approaches have shown great promise in contributing to the replacement of animals in toxicity testing:

Structure-activity relationship (SAR) analyses use computers to predict biological responses to chemicals based on their molecular structure, weight and electronic charge. SAR data can be used to estimate whether a specific chemical produces effects such as toxicity without the use of animals. SAR’s have been found to predict effects such as skin sensitisation, developmental toxicity and carcinogenicity for related groups of chemicals with 85 to 97 per cent accuracy. Although SAR models have proven to be extremely useful in the screening of chemicals, they are not stand-alone replacements. Therefore, they must be used in combination with other non-animal methods, such as cell-culture systems.

Computer-based mathematical modelling involves the use of computers to model living biological systems, such as the human circulatory and respiratory systems. For example, physiologically based biokinetic models (PBBK’s) use computers to study the absorption, distribution, metabolism and excretion of a chemical by the body. They can also be used to determine the relationship between the dose of a chemical and a particular metabolic effect. One such model, the ED01, studies tumour production in response to chemical exposure. It can detect increased tumour activity of 1 per cent at exposure levels much lower than those used in rodent toxicity studies.

There is much scientific evidence documenting the failure of animal-based toxicity tests to accurately predict human reactions to chemicals. Such errors are not surprising, given the many differences that exist between species in terms of their anatomy, physiology, biochemistry and metabolism. Such variables make the cross-species extrapolation of test results an extremely uncertain exercise.

The following examples illustrate some of the key shortcomings of animal-based toxicity studies:

• The Multicenter Evaluation of In-Vitro Cytotoxicity study (a seven-year programme) compared the results of rat and mouse acute toxicity tests for 50 chemicals to the results of real human exposure and found that these tests were able to predict toxicity in humans with only 65 per cent accuracy. In fact, scientists at a recent international conference on acute toxicity testing held in Washington DC stated that they weren’t sure whether the results of acute toxicity tests in rats were even relevant to other rats! In contrast, a series of four human cell line tests were found to predict human toxicity with 84 per cent accuracy.

• Unlike humans, rodents have no vomit reflex. As a result of being unable to clear toxic chemicals from the body, their level of exposure to chemicals is proportionately increased, making extrapolation of rodent test results to humans highly questionable.

• Rodents only live for two or three years, but the average human life span is 75 years or more. This is highly significant when considering lifelong toxicity studies. For example, rats are more susceptible to cancer than humans who, because of their long life span, have developed more defences against spontaneous cancers. Likewise, animal species are born at developmentally different stages, making the results of developmental toxicity studies virtually meaningless for human infants and children.

• In addition to differences between animal species, there can also be significant differences between subspecies and different strains of the same species. For example, the chemical ethyl carbamate caused high incidences of cancer in certain mouse strains, but not in others. Likewise, chloroform has been found to cause liver tumours in various strains of female mice but not in the males.

• There have also been numerous cases where animal-based toxicity tests have failed to predict birth defects in humans. For example, a series of disinfectants marketed in Italy under the names Mipaphox, Trichlorphan and Diptorex caused nervous system damage in humans and other animals, yet mice in toxicity studies were fed doses of up to 1,500 mg/kg without any apparent negative effects.

• The shortcomings of animal-based approaches are also evident from the results of carcinogenicity studies. Arsenic, for example, was not classified as carcinogenic following animal studies, but was later found to cause high levels of lung cancer in smelter workers exposed to arsenic in the air. Similarly, the causal link between benzene and human leukaemia was established in 1928; however, numerous subsequent animal studies failed to demonstrate this effect.

• The very conditions under which animals are kept in laboratories and the round of painful and debilitating tests to which they are routinely subjected are in themselves capable of affecting every organ and biochemical system in the body. Factors such as noise, restraint, isolation, pain, psychological distress, overcrowding, bedding materials, regrouping, separation from mothers, sleeplessness, hypersexuality, surgery and anaesthesia can all increase mortality, contact sensitivity, tumour susceptibility and metastatic spread as well as decrease viral resistance and immune response.



Click here to view additional examples.

What experts have said about chemical-testing on animals:

‘It is simply not possible with all the animals in the world to go through chemicals in the blind way we have at the present time and reach credible conclusions about the hazards to human health.’

—Dr Joshua Lederberg, Nobel Laureate in Medicine

‘It is generally accepted that correlations [between animal-test results and human safety] are not good … due to species differences.’

—Frank Barile, PhD

‘Extensive safety testing on millions of animals will seriously delay the acquisition of important safety information, because many of these tests are expensive, time-consuming and of dubious scientific value.’

—Gill Langley, PhD (Cantab), MIBiol, Cbio

‘Animal studies of lead, mercury and PCB’s each underestimated the levels of exposures that cause effects in humans by 100- to 10,000-fold. Regulatory decisions that rely largely on toxicity testing in genetically similar animals under controlled laboratory conditions will continue to fail to reflect threats to the capacities and complexity of the human brain as well as important gene-environment interactions.’

—Physicians for Social Responsibility

‘Animal-testing seems to function mostly as a mechanism to frustrate demands for accountability [since] conflicting results beget endless studies that ensure inaction. It is the ambiguous results and subjective interpretations of animal studies that have created an atmosphere conducive to arbitrary and capricious decision-making, allowing regulatory agencies to be driven by pressures of market interests over concern for public health.’

—American Association for Science and Public Policy

im glad they test medical sciences on animals i mean this way we dont have to bother testing it on humans 1st..besides animals dont have souls so its ok.

You may very well be in the wrong line of work, I think you would be of great benefit at the Huntingdon labs. Even though people are trying to get it to close down, you still have a chance to donate your efforts to their "work".