The reality for laboratory animals in France: behind a torrent of figures

General suffering...

The proportion of procedures named as ‘severe’ is particularly high in our country. While it is one in ten in the European Union, it is one in seven in France. We are sometimes told that this is due to France judging the severity of experiments with less rigidity than other countries...

But on what basis is this argument? On nothing. And all European Union member states have the same examples in the Directive appendix on the different levels of severity... Obviously, the truth is hard to take in the ministry corridors.

Genetically modified bloodlines and increased suffering

Between 2015 and 2020, we counted a hundred procedures classified at the highest level of severity for the creation and maintenance of genetically modified animal (GMA) bloodlines.

In 2021, there were more than 15,500 mice who appeared in the statement which is almost the maximum total number for a sole establishment. The explanation? This is a place that provides strains of GMAs to others... let’s admit it. But this does not explain why the number of individuals born with genetic modifications causing them the worst pain has risen so much. On this point, the silence of the Ministry is deafening.

And this increase is not about to stop because for 2022 and 2023 we already know that at least two projects have been approved authorising the use of several thousands, or even tens of thousands of mice in the years to come to create new animal bloodlines who will suffer a true ordeal...

More than 150,000 rabbits

Among all those who have the misfortune of passing between these walls, laboratories still have a more marked ‘taste’ for rabbits. In 2021, there were more than 150,000 of them who had to ensure tests, and almost all of them were killed.

Worse: the procedures causing them so-called ‘moderate’ pain continue to increase. 54,000 of them have been used for the production of blood-based products. And this procedure will not stop since it received authorisation to allow the use of 87,500 individuals in 2022.

19,000 female rabbits have been genetically modified to produce a protein in their milk. These experiments are considered ‘light’ and, again, they have a bright future ahead of them with a project to create new strains having been approved to produce this type of antibody in 2022.

Zebrafish: an exponential number of victims

Although zebrafish are not as numerous as rabbits in French animal testing establishments, their number does not stop growing and they are the subject of more and more ‘moderate’ and ‘severe’ experiments. In 2021, there were 23,000 that endured the first tests for both toxicology and ecotoxicology that were not even compulsory; and 15,000 to have been subjected to the second tests to study ‘animal diseases’.

It is hard to know what all of this is supposed to be for, but what is for certain is that a host of zebrafish suffered from it, with fishes’ ability to feel pain having been debated for a long time…

And then there are dogs and primates

Finally, more than 200 dogs and 130 primates have also been subjected to ‘severe’ experiments. Among them, 40 dogs were used to test the toxicity of human medications, while around fifteen primates were victims of unexpected complications.

These figures may seem anecdotal with regard to the millions of animals experimented on in France each year, but in reality they are very significant when we know that France makes up a part of the countries in Europe who carry out the most tests on dogs and primates.

Once again, it took patience to get the latest detailed figures on animal testing. We will stop at nothing and we will continue to distribute them so that everyone can know what is happening behind the doors of French laboratories. All of the figures from 2015 to 2021 are available on our site dedicated to the analysis of ministerial data.

Translated from the French by Joely Justice