The news that Cambridge University is not going ahead with plans for a laboratory to study brain diseases may be a victory for animal rights but it is bad news for medical research in the UK. However, Cambridge did not give up voluntarily. It was forced to because of the effect of animal rights protests.
The laboratory was intended to carry out research into diseases that are a big problem, particularly for elderly people. Parkinson's affects 120,000 people in the UK - medicines can help many, but by no means all; more than 130,000 strokes are recorded each year, though doctors admit this is probably an underestimate; and Alzheimer's affects more than 750,000 people. This laboratory would have pushed forward research into all these diseases.
Britain has some of the world's leading brain researchers, and they need world-class facilities. The Cambridge laboratory was designed to carry out research on primates, because some key experiments into these diseases can be done only by studying our biological relatives. The laboratory would have provided improved care and housing for these animals as well.
For decades, campaigners have questioned the value of studying other animals to develop treatments for humans. Sometimes they claim that animal experimentation is a "false science" that never produces the right answer. The history of modern medicine tells a different story.
In 1922, Frederick Banting and Charles Best performed the crucial experiments that discovered insulin. They surgically removed the pancreas from a dog to make it diabetic and showed that injecting semi-purified pancreatic extracts could reverse the disease. Working with biochemists they purified the insulin - something that could be achieved only by testing on rabbits - until they had a preparation that could be used on human patients. Over 5 million lives have been saved by insulin.
Antibiotics were also discovered through animal research. What is an antibiotic? When penicillin was developed in the 1940s, the crucial test was to see if it could protect mice against otherwise fatal bacteria. Alexander Fleming, who had discovered penicillin 10 years before, failed to carry out this test and assumed it was merely an antiseptic, not worth investigating further.
In fact, almost every major medical advance of the past hundred years has depended on animal testing. This includes organ transplantation, vaccines for diphtheria, polio and meningitis, open-heart surgery, anaesthetics, coronary bypass surgery and drugs for high blood pressure, asthma and leukaemia.
Some experiments would not work on mice or rats, so other animals have had to be used. The pig has a heart and blood vessels much like those of humans, so they are often used for research into heart surgery. Primates are used for vaccines, new anti-cancer treatments and some areas of brain research, and their use is only permitted if the experiments would be unworkable on other animals. Their use led to the polio vaccine and new treatments for Aids and Parkinson's.
There is an important distinction that must be made in this debate. There are many legitimate groups that campaign for animal welfare. There are even groups that campaign against any animal use. But these groups campaign within the law. They lobby parliament, write letters, print leaflets, send out press releases, question the value of animal research and even launch legal appeals. And they have every right to do so. There is a legitimate public debate about animal research and it should not be stifled. If it were not for animal welfare and anti-vivisection groups, I doubt if our laboratory animal welfare laws would be so strong.
The animal rights campaign against the Cambridge laboratory used threats of intimidation and harassment to cause ever greater delays. The university realised that if the threats continued, the campaign would escalate into the type of violence and law-breaking that had been used against nearby Huntingdon Life Sciences. The decision to pull the plug was not welcome, but it was understandable.
To its credit, the government has supported animal research and has shown that it is willing to tackle animal rights extremism. A special police squad was set up to focus on the extremists. Laws on harassment and protest were tightened. However, this latest victory for the extremists makes it clear that such measures are not enough. The time has come for the government to really get tough. The only thing that is known to deter these extremists is tough laws, tough policing and long prison sentences. That is what is needed to protect our medical research and medical researchers.
· Dr Mark Matfield is executive director of the Research Defence Society, which represents medical researchers who use laboratory animals
markmatfield@rds-online.org.uk
