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Oxford University opens new animal research lab
2008-11-11
LONDON (AFP) - The first mice have been delivered to a new research facility at Oxford University, which has been targeted by animal activists but which supporters say will play a key part in biomedical research. The university announced its highly controversial Biomedical Sciences Building was finally open, five years after work began. Construction was stopped in July 2004 following animal rights protests aimed at contract workers on the site, but resumed in November 2005 after the university obtained a court order limiting demonstrations to one day a week. Security remains tight around the building, where scientists will use animals in their research into cancer, strokes, heart disease, diabetes, HIV, epilepsy, Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. Research animals now housed in old buildings around the university will be moved to the new site, with the transfer expected to be complete by mid-2009. Almost all -- 98 percent -- of the animals housed there will be rodents, the vast majority of them mice, while fish, frogs, ferrets and primates will also be used. Primates will make up less than 0.5 percent. Professor Alastair Buchan, head of Oxford's medical sciences division, one of Europe's largest medical research hubs, said the building represented a "significant step forward for biomedical research" at the university. He said it would provide a facility for "all kinds of ground-breaking work", but stressed that scientists there would only use animals "when no other technique is available". "Some animal use is still essential for medical progress. The new building will help us deliver on our commitment to animal care while pursuing life-saving medical advances," Buchan said. However, Michelle Thew, chief executive of the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV), said: "It is depressing that, in a collective failure of imagination, our leading institutions are choosing to repeat the failed patterns of the past, rather than investing in the future. "Humanity will pay a high price until our public money goes into modern, humane, reliable, non-animal research to deliver cures for diseases."
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