'MONKEYS' DESCEND ON HOME OFFICE TO PROTEST PAIN RECLASSIFICATION ATTEMPT

PETA Delivers Open Letter Calling for End to Cruel Neurological Experiments on Primates

London – To mark World Day for Animals in Laboratories (24 April), PETA members gathered outside the Home Office wearing monkey masks to protest experimenters' attempts to change the category of suffering assigned to neurological experiments on primates from "severe" to "moderate". They delivered an open letter with more than 40,000 signatures to the Home Office, calling on the government not only to reject attempts to downgrade the severity classification but also to end these cruel experiments altogether.

Photos are available here, here, here, and here.

"The suffering experienced by sensitive animals during these experiments is severe and should be categorised as such. Experimenters need to stop trying to downplay the pain and distress to which animals are subjected", says PETA Science Policy Adviser Dr Julia Baines. "PETA is urging the Home Office to end these fruitless and obsolete monkey torture sessions and move instead towards more relevant and humane computer-based research methods, human-derived models, and advanced scanning and imaging techniques."

PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that "animals are not ours to experiment on" – notes that neurological experiments often involve cementing bolts to monkeys' skulls, implanting electrodes into their brains, and keeping them hungry or thirsty while confining them to restraint chairs and forcing them to complete repetitive behavioural tasks for hours at a time. Lowering the severity categorisation to "moderate" would mean less scrutiny of experimenters by the Animals in Science Committee, fewer restrictions on reusing monkeys in experiments, and less frequent inspections of facilities.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk.