New Poll: Support for Animal Testing in Britain Continues to Decline

A new government-funded poll by Ipsos MORI shows that the British public continues to voice strong and ever-growing opposition to the use of animals in experiments and also continues to mistrust both experimenters and the inadequate rules governing this archaic and often discredited practice.

According to the latest figures:

• Thirty-two per cent of Britons object to the use of animals in experiments.
• Thirty-one per cent have little to no faith in the regulatory system that governs animal experimentation.
• Thirty per cent do not trust experimenters to avoid causing unnecessary suffering to animals.

These figures all show a continuing decline in support for cruel experiments since the last poll in 2012 – and with good reason.

Evidence recently published in BMJ (formerly known as the British Medical Journal) demonstrates that experiments on animals overwhelmingly fail to benefit human beings, yet millions of animals are still poisoned, starved, surgically mutilated, electrocuted and burned in British laboratories without a thought to scientific findings about their needs, behaviour and sentience.

Animal experimenters have been allowed to conduct cruel procedures on animals under a veil of secrecy that prevents proper scrutiny. Earlier this year, thousands of people wrote to the Home Office asking it to repeal this secrecy clause, Section 24 of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 – it’s urgent that ministers listen to the public and ensure greater transparency about how animals suffer in UK laboratories.

The number of those who object to animal experiments will undoubtedly rise as people become aware of exciting, progressive and effective science that uses non-animal methods to the advantage of both humans and other species. If the UK is to be at the forefront of science, we must accept the overwhelming majority view (79 per cent) of the public by embracing and investing in these new technologies instead of focusing on animal tests that delay medical progress and dangerously mislead us about disease.

Image: © Doctors Against Animal Experiments