Almost 100 ‘Dogs’ And ‘Cats’ Line To Plead For Protection In Laboratories

For Immediate Release:
6 August 2011


Contact:
Sandra Smiley +44 (0)207 357 9229, ext 229; [email protected]


London – Today, standing in formation, wearing white boiler suits and dog and cat masks, and holding signs that read, “Help Us. Don’t Weaken UK Lab Laws”, more than almost 100 PETA supporters participated in an eye-catching photo opportunity at Marble Arch in London. They are demanding that the government not adopt lower standards of protection for animals in laboratories when it transposes the EU’s new directive regulating animal experiments later this year. If the government adopts the directive without changes, all animals will be affected, but dogs and cats in particular would become far more likely to be used in experiments because they would lose the special protections Britain has given them for more than 25 years.


“Britons don’t want more cats and dogs experimented on or more suffering for the millions of other animals used in laboratories. They want fewer animals used and less pain”, says PETA policy adviser Alistair Currie. “We are calling on the public to send a clear message to the government that they will not allow laws that protect British animals to fall the level of the EU’s lowest common denominator.”
                                                                           
The Home Office is currently holding a public consultation on options for transposing the directive. (The consultation closes on 5 September.) Although the government can retain higher welfare standards where they already exist, it is considering adopting the directive wholesale, even if it means more animal suffering than what is allowed under current UK law.


For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk.