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The Guardian. 10 March 2006
www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,,1727750,00.html
We're not terrorists, and we're not against progress.

Protesters against animal experimentation should not be caricatured as anti-science, says Sharon Howe.

Despite his Orwellian imagery, Timothy Garton Ash's stereotypical presentation of an enlightened pro-vivisection elite versus an ignorant and destructive bunch of "antis" is hardly consistent with his declared belief in the "pursuit of truth and the defence of reason" (We must stand up to the creeping tyranny of the group veto, March 2). These principles are genuinely close to my heart. That's why I am passionately opposed to animal experimentation. And that's why I am returning my first-class Oxford degree as a personal protest against the university's new biomedical research centre.

Yes, animal testing has always gone on at Oxford. But the university has also produced some eminent critics of animal-based research: John Ruskin resigned his position as professor of literature the day after vivisection was introduced.

It is ironic that Garton Ash should centre his argument on the importance of free speech, as it is this vital privilege which is being eroded by the injunction imposed upon those who wish to exercise their right to peaceful protest - they are now allowed to voice their views outside the college only between 1pm and 5pm on Thursdays.

It may make for better headlines to portray anti-vivisectionists as terrorists bent on obstructing medical progress, but it couldn't be further from the truth. The vast majority are compassionate individuals who find it an outrage that millions of pounds of taxpayers' money is wasted on outdated and misleading animal-based research, while doctors at Oxford's own Radcliffe Infirmary are crying out for funds to invest in human-based stroke research. The time has come for a proper, reasoned debate: to get away from the specious "dog or child" dilemma with which pro-vivisectionists seek to play on our fears. The Home Office itself admitted that it "has not commissioned or evaluated any formal research on the efficacy of animal experiments".

Despite the fact that human brains can now be studied non-invasively using hi-tech scanners, diseases such as Parkinson's - for which I am particularly keen to see a cure as I watch my own mother suffer from its debilitating effects - are still being painfully and artificially induced in monkeys who do not naturally develop them.

But the tide of public opinion is changing. Plans for a similar animal lab at Cambridge were abandoned after the university failed to prove a "national need" at a public planning meeting. In 2002, MEPs voted for a complete review of the use of all primates in experiments. And there has been strong support among MPs for an Early Day Motion calling for an independent scientific evaluation of the clinical relevance of animal testing - support shared by 83% of GPs, according to a survey by Europeans for Medical Progress. The technology to achieve change already exists - it is institutional inertia and vested interests that are holding back progress. Here is the perfect opportunity to move forward and develop a centre of excellence for cutting-edge, non-animal research which would only enhance Oxford's reputation as a seat of human progress. Then I too could regain my pride in being associated with it. Sharon Howe is a graduate of Oxford university

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September 2011
New animal experimentation law: VERO calls for stricter controls
Directive 2010/63/EU on the protection of animals used for scientific purposes is due to be transposed into UK law by the end of 2012. The Home Office public consultation on how this should be done has just ended. The standards set out in the Directive would actually allow for (but not require) some weakening of the UK's already disappointing law. VERO has responded to the consultation urging the Government to retain the requirements of UK law where they are stricter than the Directive, while incorporating any new measures conducive to improving animal protection.

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Oxford Magazine, No. 289, Trinity Term 2009
Coetzee in Oxford
Matthew Simpson

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An Open Letter on Parkinson’s research - Neuroscientist Marius Maxwell sets the record straight on Parkinson's research
Marius Maxwell
In an open letter to VERO, Oxford University alumnus Marius Maxwell MBBChir DPhil (MD PhD) strongly refutes the often repeated claim that the deep brain stimulation technique used to treat Parkinson's disease patients has its origins in primate research. On the contrary, he argues, the technique was first developed in humans decades before the first monkey model of Parkinson's was ever conceived. In a detailed chronology of the research undertaken in this field over the last century, Maxwell demonstrates that all the major advances in the treatment of movement disorders have come about through the study of actual human patients, not contrived animal models. To suggest otherwise is, according to Maxwell, to distort the true historical facts and ignore the key contributions of earlier, pioneering neuroscientists. Worst of all, the continued justification and funding of primate research for Parkinson's disease and similar disorders is hampering the development of other, more progressive and humanly relevant techniques, and hence delaying the discovery of a definitive treatment for the disease. In conclusion, Maxwell therefore calls for an immediate end to such research, in the interests not just of the defenceless animals on whom it is conducted, but of the human patients still awaiting a cure for their debilitating disease.

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Cherwell, Thurs 20 November
Tony Benn joins animal lab protest

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Oxford Student, Thurs 20 November
Tony Benn joins fight against Oxford's lab

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Oxford Mail, Mon 17 November
Tony Benn joins lab protest

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"A duty from which I cannot deviate": Bodley's Librarian and the New Laboratory
Matthew Simpson

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Oxford Magazine #272, Hilary Term, 2008
The Future Of Food
Paul Freestone

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Oxford Magazine, Hilary Term, 2007
A Physiologist comes to Oxford
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March 2007 issue of the Parish Magazine of St Giles' and St Margaret's, Oxford
Animal Rights
Martin Henig, Hon. Professor, University College London (Institute of Archaeology) and Fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford

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The Guardian, 18 February 2007
Experimental Theatre
Marius Maxwell

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Oxford Magazine, 12 January 2007
Ethics And The Weatherall Report
Dr Katherine Morris, Fellow in Philosophy, Mansfield College

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Press release 24 December 2006
Oxford Vivisectionists are Swimming Against the Tide
Marius Maxwell

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Church Times, 8 September 2006, p.13
The sacrifice of animals to save human lives
Dr Martin Henig

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Response published in “Oxford Magazine”, Trinity Term 2006
I Protest Against Bad Arguments – Do You?
An Oxford philosophy tutor

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Press release 03 July 2006
New group of Oxford academics calls University to account over animal lab

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The Independent. 06 March 2006
comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article349525.ece
Sharon Howe: Animal testing is both cruel and unnecessary

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The Guardian. 10 March 2006
www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,,1727750,00.html
We're not terrorists, and we're not against progress.


Voice for Ethical Research at Oxford