Say NO to animal experiments at the Royal Veterinary College

The Royal Veterinary College (RVC) boasts it is ‘one of the top three veterinary schools in the world’. However, using the Freedom of Information Act, Animal Aid has obtained reports that detail numerous blunders and poor practice, including: beagle puppies being put down after suffering severe injuries that resulted from an attack by an adult dog; guinea pigs euthanased because of ‘simple wound breakdown; and a sheep dying on the operating table because her pre-surgery food intake had not been controlled properly, she had not been positioned correctly on the operating table and there had been a lack of adequate monitoring during anaesthesia. Another report provides details of a pregnant ewe, who was mistakenly used for an experiment – an error that led to her lamb being culled.

Inadequate facilities also seem to be the cause of ‘unhappy ponies’ kept for teaching purposes. Similarly, we read of dogs ‘having a lack of stimulation, especially at weekends’ due to them being housed in the upper floor of a building.

One document explains that RVC staff who treat clinical patients ‘will want to know why we are involved in harming animals from the same species’. It is not only RVC staff who want an explanation for this practice; so do thousands of members of the public who have already contacted the College, to voice their concern. Please contact Professor Stuart Reid, Principal of the RVC, and ask him to stop the College’s research programme and to rehome all the animals held there.

Please contact Professor Stuart Reid, Principal, Royal Veterinary College, to voice your concern.

Professor

Stuart

Reid

The Royal Veterinary College

Dear Professor Reid

I am extremely troubled by the news from Animal Aid that details the conditions under which the Royal Veterinary College (RVC) is keeping and experimenting on animals.

The RVC’s responses to Animal Aid’s Freedom of Information Act requests revealed that: two puppies were euthanased after being attacked by an adult dog; two guinea pigs ‘had to be put down due to a simple wound breakdown’; and a sheep died on the operating table because her pre-surgery food intake had not been controlled properly, she had not been positioned correctly on the operating table, and there had been a lack of adequate monitoring during anaesthesia. There was also a pregnant ewe who was mistakenly used for an experiment - an error that led to her lamb being culled.

RVC’s competence is called into question in one AWERB report which stated, after an unspecified problem was highlighted by a Home Office inspector: ‘it was worrying that it had taken the Home Office Inspector pointing out the elements that were not acceptable for it to be sorted. It was very concerning that the staff had not spotted and resolved this themselves. The College as a veterinary school should be setting high standards for itself and not let conditions deteriorate’.

The RVC boasts how it is in the top three veterinary schools in the world, while animals are dying, or being severely injured and are described by your own Animal Welfare and Ethical Review Body as being ‘unhappy’ and lacking in stimulation.

It is shocking enough that the RVC’s research programme uses 9,000 animals a year; to hear of the conditions in which some of these animals live and die, brings further shame to the RVC.

I would ask that you cease all experiments on animals, both on scientific and moral grounds, and re-home those animals, destined for research. In addition, those used for teaching demonstrations should not be kept in sub-optimum conditions merely because this is more convenient for those involved.

Kind regards,
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