You can kill mosquitoes and catch flies with adhesive tape. But vertebrates should not be killed without a reasonable reason. It’s been that way for a long time Animal Welfare Act. However, the punishment for the senseless killing of animals will soon become significantly harsher. That looks a draft bill for the amendment to the Animal Protection Act which was drawn up in the house of Federal Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir (Greens). The protest against this is huge – and from the Ministry of Agriculture’s point of view it comes from an unexpected direction, namely from researchers.
They fear that they will have one foot in prison in the future if they carry out animal experiments. Almost all major research organizations have therefore already written warning letters to the Ministry of Agriculture. The amendment to the law would have “fatal medium to long-term effects on science as a location and health care,” writes the Working Group of Scientific Medical Societies. And the German Cancer Society warns against one “a hitherto unknown cut in the research landscape” that would isolate Germany and rob German cancer research of its competitiveness.
What’s behind all of this is that it’s still pretty unclear what actually constitutes a “reasonable reason” for killing animals. In any case, economic interests are not enough, that has been clear since the “chick judgment” of the Federal Administrative Court in June 2019. Since then, day-old male chicks are no longer allowed to be shredded simply because they are never suitable for laying hens and are therefore considered useless in the chicken industry.
In 2022, 1.77 million “surplus animals” were killed in Germany
Judges and researchers are now likely to largely agree that officially approved experiments in the context of medical research can be a reasonable reason for killing laboratory animals. The only problem is: millions of laboratory animals die every year without ever taking part in an experiment.
Because laboratory mice are not forest and meadow mice. In order to achieve usable results for medical research, special animals are needed, which are usually bred specifically for the planned experiments. However, because mice do not roll off the assembly line and chance always plays a role in reproduction, even under controlled laboratory conditions, animals are regularly created that ultimately cannot be used. They have the wrong gender, do not have the desired genetic makeup to simulate a disease being researched – or preliminary experiments went differently than planned, meaning that bred mice cannot be used. Therefore, in 2022 According to the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment, 1.77 million of a total of 4.2 million laboratory animals were tested in German laboratories killed as “surplus animals”.
This has been viewed very critically since the Küken verdict at the latest. After all, killing surplus animals is comparable to killing unwanted male chicks: you don’t need the animals; feeding them takes up space and money. That’s why a cascade principle has been established in some federal states, says Stefan Treue, director of the German Primate Center in Göttingen and spokesman for the “Understanding Animal Experiments” initiative. First, attempts are made to keep the number of surplus animals as low as possible through careful breeding and planning. But if such animals are created and they cannot be used for other experiments, possibly at other institutes, attempts are made to sell them to zoos or pet shops as reptile food. Only when none of this is possible do you kill them.
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“If the cascade has been processed and everything has been carefully documented, as a scientist you have tried everything to act in accordance with the law,” says Treue. “But you still can’t be legally certain.” In addition, the cascade principle only exists in a few federal states. “Ultimately you hope that everything goes well,” says the primate researcher.
The scientific organizations fear that the amendment to the Animal Protection Act could make everything even more uncertain for researchers. The draft bill for amending the Animal Protection Act does not provide any clarity as to what you are allowed to do as a scientist. Instead, it provides for higher penalties for killing without a reasonable reason: prison sentences should be between six months and five years if the acts are “persistently repeated”, committed “for profit” or affect “a large number of vertebrates”. At least the first and last points could apply to researchers, depending on their interpretation. Previously, the maximum sentence was three years – and there was no minimum sentence.
It obviously makes sense that the number of laboratory animals be kept as low as possible and that as few animals as possible be killed as “surplus animals,” emphasizes Michael Baumann, CEO of the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ). At the DKFZ, as at other institutes, the number of these animals has continued to be reduced, and the overall number of laboratory animals is also decreasing. Animal experiments are increasingly being replaced by cell experiments. “But scientific research in the field of “Health cannot be achieved without animal testing,” says Baumann. And surplus breeding of laboratory animals cannot be completely prevented even with careful planning. Many research associations are therefore demanding an exception for laboratory animals in the law. Otherwise, the funds for medical research could not be used efficiently for their important purpose not be used, but would literally be eaten up.
Animal rights activists, however, vehemently reject the call for an exception for laboratory animals. “It cannot be the case that millions of animals are generally excluded from the protection status of the Animal Protection Act,” writes the Federal Association of People for Animal Rights in a press release. He recommends that the handling of surplus laboratory animals be regulated elsewhere. So far, there has been no signal from the Federal Ministry of Justice to allay the researchers’ worries. A spokesman said upon request that the amendment to the law would not create a new criminal offence. Killing animals without a reasonable reason is already a criminal offense, and what constitutes a reasonable reason will not be reassessed. But from the researchers’ point of view, that is exactly the problem.