Whistle-Blower Video Shows Harrowing Animal Suffering In Spanish Testing Lab

An international animal rights organisation supported by Paul McCartney, Peter Dinklage, Joanna Lumley and Ricky Gervais has released a secretly-filmed video showing disturbing cruelty at a testing laboratory.

Whistle-blower footage secured by Cruelty Free International (CFI), an NGO working to end animal experimentation, shows what they describe as unlawful abuse of animals in the Vivotecnia facility in Madrid, Spain.

The video taken by a former employee shows deliberate cruelty inflicted on scared animals that are in pain, including monkeys, dogs, pigs, rabbits, mice and rats.

Animals are euthanised in the film, many with casually cruel procedures in the presence of other animals, and more are filmed as they die from incorrectly administered procedures.

Credit: Carlota Saorsa-Cruelty Free International/Real Press
Primates cages in the lab in Madrid, Spain, reported by the organization in April 2021.

Rough handling and appalling procedures are documented as the animals suffer severe pain and anxiety while being cut open without anaesthesia or have their spines broken during experiments due to poor handling.

Voices in the video are modified to avoid recognition of workers but captions document the taunts and abuse used by staff. One lab-coated employee invokes images of WWII Nazi experiments by commenting: “Like Hitler.” [6:31]

Dr Katy Taylor, Director of Science at CFI said in an interview with Real Press: “The footage was taken by a whistle-blower who worked at the facility between 2018 and 2020.

“Sadly, this is the reality of life for many animals inside laboratories,” she said. “The footage shows yet again the dark side of regulatory toxicity testing on animals.

“Every year, approximately two million animals across Europe are deliberately poisoned in regulatory toxicity tests that cause them terrible suffering.

Credit: Carlota Saorsa-Cruelty Free International/Real Press
Rabbit stock sideways in the lab in Madrid, Spain, reported by the organization in April 2021.

“The graphic images uncovered illustrate just how appalling this suffering is and why it needs to be stopped.”

Dr Taylor said Vivotecnia is a contract research organisation that services a global client base doing preclinical product development for pharmaceutical and biotech companies. It also conducts product safety studies for the cosmetic, chemical and agrochemical industries.

She said the laboratory does pharmacokinetic (movement of drugs within the body) and toxicokinetic (what happens to a substance in the body) studies, acute and repeated dose studies in rabbits, rats, mice, dogs, pigs and monkeys, carcinogenicity studies and reproductive toxicity studies.

“We believe that Vivotecnia is systematically in breach of EU and Spanish laws governing the protection of animals used for scientific purposes by causing unnecessary suffering in a number of key areas,” added Dr Taylor.

On its website, Vivotecnia states: “The welfare of animals used for research purposes is of paramount relevance for Vivotecnia, and also the strict compliance and respect to the current legislation on the protection of animals used in research and for other scientific purposes, including education,” adding: “Our aim is to achieve the highest standards in animal welfare.”

It also states personnel and researchers “have the adequate education and training” and resources are provided to “properly keep research animals in terms of facilities, husbandry, wellbeing, and veterinary care”. [https://www.vivotecnia.com/animal-welfare/]

Credit: Carlota Saorsa-Cruelty Free International/Real Press
Dog behind bars in the lab of Madrid, Spain, reported by the organization in April 2021.

Dr Taylor said: “The European commission tells us that directive 2010/63 not only protects animals used in science but that it also provides a strategy to replace animal testing.

“It does neither.

“There’s clearly an issue with facilities not being inspected frequently enough in Spain and this is a good example of why there need to be more inspections.

“This is building a very strong picture that there’s something fundamentally very wrong with animal experiments in Europe.

Dr Taylor told Real Press that CFI has reported Vivotecnia to the authorities for licensing animal experiments in Spain and is considering reporting the abuse to the police.

CFI’s Chief Executive, Michelle Thew, said: “This investigation has yet again uncovered appalling animal suffering, inadequate care, poor practices and breaches of European and national law.”

Credit: Carlota Saorsa-Cruelty Free International/Real Press
Dog with dead eye and blood in the lab of Madrid, Spain, reported by the organization in April 2021.

She said the secret investigation into Vivotecnia that CFI conducted throughout 2020 shows animal misery and the laboratory’s disregard of the law.

“How many more times do we have to reveal the reality of life for animals in laboratories before action is taken?” she asked. “Vivotecnia must be closed immediately and Europe’s authorities must at last bring forward proposals to bring the use of animals in research to an end.”

CFI is one of the world’s oldest and most respected animal protection organisations and an authority on animal testing issues. It regularly advises governments, media, corporations and official bodies.

The NGO does not know how many animals are used in the laboratory but says that Spain conducted 817,742 experiments on animals in 2019 with 12 percent for the regulatory testing of human and veterinary medicines according to the most recently available official statistics.

Official EU statistics say that Spain was the fourth biggest user of animals in the EU in 2017.

A CFI statement said toxicity testing involving dosing animals to see how much of a chemical or drug it takes to cause serious harm is an unreliable way to determine a safe dose for humans as each animal species reacts differently to the same substance.

But the effects of testing inflicted on animals are severe, painful and eventually deadly.

The organisation is encouraging people to sign a petition calling for authorities to immediately revoke Vivotecnia’s licence to carry out experiments.


To find out more about the author, editor or agency that supplied this story – please click below.
Story By: Grainger Laffan, Sub-Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency:  Newsflash

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