Our Mission
Ban testing on dogs in the UK by adding them to the exemption list alongside great apes.
It is our belief that testing on dogs is morally wrong and has no place in our society any longer. Dogs are our family members, our best friends. They are emotional, caring, loving animals. They are NOT test subjects.
We understand that there are those that dislike the idea of experiments on dogs… but have been convinced these tests are necessary for the scientific development and progress of medicines & treatment. We aim to present the evidence to you that proves this is NOT the case.
Research on dogs is not predictive of safety in humans. This evidence is being ignored in favour of doing what we have always done. That is not acceptable.
Why are beagles the breed of choice for experiments? Because of their physical traits and medium size, but also due to their submissive behaviour and gentle, docile temperament. The same characteristics that make beagles soft, loving companions are the very reasons why they are victims of laboratory experiments.
[Beagle Freedom Project]
HOUNDED CAMPAIGN BELIEVE THE FOLLOWING…
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1. It is morally wrong to test on dogs.
We choose species that are submissive and gentle, we have a responsibility to be better. We protect dogs in all other ways from banning puppy farms to the animal welfare act. Including dogs in testing is cruel and contradictory.
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2. Dogs have a level of sentience similar to a child.
The dogs will be extremely stressed in the environment of a cage, facility, laboratory. Using the scientific measure of a harm:benefit analysis, we will show the immense harm, and the speculative, overstated benefits from dog experiments.
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3. The negative impact that a laboratory environment has on a dog’s physiology.
The stress, anxiety, pain, fear and sadness experienced by these sentient, social animals in laboratories is not only cruel but will inevitably impact results. The treatment of these kind, social animals will cause severe feelings and reactions, which will affect their whole body system.
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4. Toxicology experiments on dogs are not predictive in humans.
Around 2/3 of experiments on dogs are for toxicology purposes, involving a force-feeding procedure, where dogs are force-fed chemicals every day, for up to 90 days, with no pain relief or anaesthetic before being killed. This continues despite failing to predict human responses 70% of the time.
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5. Experiments on dogs are a waste of money.
When the level of accuracy in tests is no better than 30%, nothing more than chance, it is not a good use of tax payers money. There are approved, more accurate non animal methods for toxicology experiments that we should be using now, but we ignore in favour of doing things we have always done.
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6. Experiments on dogs poses a risk to humans.
The physiological differences between dogs and humans can be proven, and have shown a variety of issues in the past with paracetamol and many others. Potential treatments or medicines that fail in dogs may be suspended or discontinued, when it could have been beneficial and extremely important to humans.
“Working with as many passionate and knowledgeable experts, we are building an evidence-based case that will refute in black and white everything that the government have stated. We will build support, explore legal avenues and push for a change in legislation to add dogs to the exemption list. We will make sure the facts cannot be ignored.”
— Penny Weston, Founder of Hounded Campaign
Since 2014, over 20,000 dogs have been used in nearly 31,000 scientific experiments in the UK [The Kennel Club].
The government’s response to procedures on dogs is this;
“The Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 gives dogs special status whereby they can only be used in experiments if there is no alternative research model and if their use can be fully justified. “
This is not acceptable to us. 99% of all UK experiments on dogs are claimed able to predict the responses of human patients, in safety testing and disease research. The failure of these experiments is today widely reported in the peer reviewed scientific literature, [1] including by the British Medical Journal, [2] the Food and Drug Administration, [3] the US-based National Cancer Institute [4]and by experts publishing in the pharmaceutical industry [5] There is no longer any justification for using dogs in experiments for human patients. This is unethical for both dogs and humans. We must stop this torture and use state-of-the-art human-based methods, such a gene-based medicine, which has a proven track record of success.
EXPERIMENTS ON DOGS
[Various sources including RSPCA.org, GOV.uk, peta.org, bbc.co.uk, dailymail.co.uk, crueltyfreeinternational.org, thekennelclub.org.uk, naturewatch.org]
The UK Government approved 4314 experiments on 2626 beagles in 2019 [Nature Watch Foundation].
THIS HAS TO STOP.
Together we can stop this.
Stay up to date with our campaign and find out more about how you can help.