A large (half-page) article about MAWA by Mary-Anne Toy of The Age appeared on Monday, July 3rd, 2000 under the heading "Our Disposable Friends".The article endeavours, quite successfully, to present both sides of the continuing debate about the necessity to use laboratory animals. It is both encouraging and discouraging. For example, the article refers to a dramatic change of attitude among students from the days when rats, being used for demonstrations, were killed by hitting their heads on the side of a laboratory bench. Now, a generation later, ten per cent of Melbourne University students refuse to experiment with animals at all, even students in the biological sciences where animal experiments once went unchallenged.
"The Medical Advances Without Animals Trust is the first in Australia and was inspired by overseas models, in particular the Dr Hadwen Trust for Humane Research in the United Kingdom, which spends more than $500,000 a year funding animal-free medical research. Among other recent projects, the Dr Hadwen Trust has supported London's Queen Charlotte's Hospital, where scientists use 'Fetal Charlotte', a computer program, to carry out virtual experiments, in place of pregnant sheep and rabbits.
Associate Professor Garry Scroop, a member of the MAWA management committee, is quoted as saying that unprecedented advances in human knowledge (chiefly the human genome project) make animal experiments redundant. Another plus could be therapeutic cloning and the resultant ability to grow human tissue on which to test drugs, rather than using laboratory animals.
Professor Scroop continues that part of the reliance on animals is inertia: animal studies have become entrenched in the medical research establishment. "It's faulty thinking...in trying to find a high blood pressure cure, animals don't help elucidate the problem in humans," he says. "People hang on to the old methods because they're familiar with them and it is expensive to change. Leading researchers would be aware of non-animal technology and this (the Trust) is a small incentive to try different methods," he continues. "We're not being confrontational, we're saying 'here's a chance to try a few different methods'. It's impossible to win a moral argument; you just polarise two groups."
Professor Stephen Leeder, the dean of the University of Sydney's faculty of medicine and one of Australia's foremost public health experts, agreed to join the MAWA Trust because he feels it is reasonable to promote alternative methods to animal research. He was impressed, when visiting the University of California at San Francisco, with the pace at which therapies are getting to the bedside faster, often by cutting out the intermediate step of animal experimentation, and technologically this is the direction of progress.
Needless to say, the pro-vivisection lobby continue to vigorously defend the necessity for animal experimentation. Diehards like Professor Jim McCluskey, chairman of Melbourne University's animal experimentation ethics committee, firmly believes animal studies are still essential. He and several other scientists doubt animal experimentation will ever end entirely.
The anti-vivisection struggle is a David and Goliath contest. The United States uses an estimated 18 million to 22 million animals a year, mainly mice and rats. The European Union countries use close to 12 million. The European Commission's published statistics of animal experiments suggest that between 1991 and 1996 there was a 24 per cent drop in the number of animals used in Europe.
Animal welfare in Australia is the responsibility of the states, so there are no national figures but a conservative estimate for Victoria and New South Wales is at least a million animals a year. In Victoria, for instance, animal numbers are collated by the Bureau of Animal Welfare (part of the Department of Natural Resources and Environment) and show that in 1998 there were 362,762 animals used in experiments in Victoria, 70 per cent of which were traditional laboratory animals (i.e. rodents).
This figure is higher than in 1997 but still lower than 1996 and 1995. A bureau spokesman says the data indicate a downward trend in recent years, but it is still too early to say whether this is statistically significant."