Nearly a fifth of animals used in NZ experiments 'suffer'

Nearly a fifth of the animals used in experiments and other research or teaching, suffered, says a national advisory watchdog.

Of the 246,122 animals "manipulated" in 2004, 13.3 per cent underwent "moderate" suffering and 5 per cent "severe" or "very severe" suffering, said the National Animal Ethics Advisory Committee.

In the Animal Welfare Act, "manipulation" means subjecting an animal to an unusual or abnormal procedure, such as exposing the animal to any parasite, micro-organism, drug, chemical, biological product or environmental condition, or enforced activity, restraint, nutrition, or surgical intervention, or depriving the animal of usual care.

Death is not counted as manipulation -- there is no distinction between the humane killing of research animals and the killing of animals for food or because they are unwanted.

In 2004, 48 per cent of animals used in research died or were humanely killed, compared with 44 per cent in 2003 and 51 per cent in 2002.

Of the 106,157 sheep used, one underwent very severe suffering, 81 severe suffering, and 1285 moderate suffering.

But 9906 rodents -- mainly rats used for testing animal health products, and mice used in testing shellfish for biotoxins -- underwent very severe suffering, just over 10 per cent of the 92,427 used. Another 43 had severe suffering and 42,691 had moderate suffering.

Among the 1627 possums used, six had moderate suffering, 156 severe suffering and 549 very severe suffering.

Most of the possums and some of the rodents were used to test new or improved poisons, toxic baits or traps.

An anti-vivisection lobby, the National Anti Vivisection Campaign (NAVC), today said that it had no faith in the animal ethics committees that oversaw animal research.

"Hundreds of thousands of animals are being killed in experiments all over the country, and the institutions that carry out these experiments, often with public money, refuse to release detailed information on the types of experiments being carried out" said NAVC spokesman Mark Eden.

He said 10,459 animals were subjected to "very severe suffering" last year, but not enough information was released to allow independent assessment of the claim that the experiments were necessary.

- NZPA