In the first case of its kind at the University of Sussex, student group Violence Free Science (VFS) has produced a detailed examination and report into live experiments on animals at the university. Sussex University - Challenged, an 18-page report compiled by students and scientific professionals, is available to download from www.violencefreescience.org.
We are constantly being told that animal experiments are vital for saving lives and that they are only carried out when there is absolutely no alternative. Yet as the new report clearly demonstrates, none of the experiments detailed in the report needed to use animals as there were other, more reliable scientific methods already available.
In fact, the report goes on to point out that the use of animals in these experiments was actually detrimental to the accumulation of relevant scientific data, having only produced somewhat unsteady evaluations that can only be loosely applied to the species that were involved in the experiment. Furthermore, the licenses for animal-based studies can only be issued by the Home Office on the basis that no alternatives could have been used - something which is clearly not the case in these examples.
While the University continues to maintain that these procedures "cannot be done without the use of live animals", this small selection of exemplary papers proves otherwise. In one example, the University tested the effects of alcohol withdrawal. The results proved particularly pointless and misleading, especially considering other technology, such as PET scans and Functional MRI could be used to monitor brain activity with consenting human volunteers according to the report's author, Molecular Biochemist Colleen McDuling BSc(Hons) MSc(Med.Sc.).
Other experiments were equally bizarre, ranging from force-feeing rats to the point of obesity and inserting electrodes into the brains of baby wild caught bats. This is all despite having access to a vast number of local resources, where human volunteer studies could have taken place in an environment that is both relevant and useful to the study. Again, these experiments had much more reliable alternatives which should have been used. Yet licenses were still granted by the Home Office for these experiments, and lavish research grants issued from drug multinationals and so-called research "charities" - at the cost of the British Taxpayer.
As a result of these findings, students and scientists are now challenging the Home Office to justify why project licenses have been issued for the University to carry out such experiments. It is a legal requirement that alternatives should be used when available - and alternatives were indeed available for the tests. Therefore the relevant licenses for such experiments should not have been issued in the first place.