Animal rights activists 'choking off' medical research

Airlines and ferry companies no longer transporting animals for testing, former science minister says
Monkeys at animal research centre
Marmoset monkeys used in animal research climb on the bars of their cage. Ferry and airline companies are refusing to carry animals for testing. Photograph: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian Graeme Robertson/Guardian

Vital medical research is being "choked off" because airlines and ferry companies are refusing to bring animals into the country for testing in the face of pressure from animal rights activists, a former science minister has warned.

Lord Drayson, who was a minister in the last Labour government, said "extremists" had picked off the companies, which had pulled out of transporting laboratory mice and other animals.

The Times reported that Stena Line had followed DFDS Seaways and P&O Ferries in halting the carriage of test animals, closing the last sea route for medical researchers.

The Channel tunnel had long refused the trade, it said, while no UK-based airline, including British Airways, would carry laboratory animals.

Imported animals account for a small proportion of those used in British laboratories, but scientists say access to genetically modified strains bred overseas is vital for some advanced research.

Drayson said that unless the government took action, university research in the UK would wither and patients needing new treatments would die.

"What the extremists have done successfully over the years is identify weak links in the chain and to target the people at those weak links to be able to stop the process," he told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

"The important thing is for the government to work with the transport industry as a whole to get together to agree that all transport companies, whether they are airlines or ferries, will support the transport of animals and therefore people cannot be picked off."

Writing in the Times, he said that the pullout of the last ferry company should be a red flag for all sides to come together to deal with the problems.

"By giving in to the protesters, they are choking off vital research into debilitating diseases such as Alzheimer's, heart disease and cancer," he wrote.

"Although small in number, animals such as mice contribute significantly to the development of new medicines to combat human and animal diseases.

"If companies continue to withdraw from transporting these animals, the search for cures will shift to other countries, some of which do not have welfare regulations as stringent as those we rightly insist upon in the UK.

"Medical research will wither in our universities, and as a result, more people will suffer and die."

The science minister, David Willetts, said the government was seeking an agreement in which the life sciences industry would agree a code of practice on the transport of animals and in return the transport industry would resume the trade.

"That is what we still hope we can put together because it makes sense for everyone," he told the Today programme.

"This is standing up for scientific research which is of great benefit to humankind. I still hope we can reach a solution which means we carry on having world-class research in Britain."