Data published by the Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Innovation (MESRI) for 2017 (click here) and data by Member State available via the European Commission portal (click here) allow comparisons with other European countries.
The main findings of this analysis are as follows.
Among the main animal “consumer” countries in the EU, France has the highest rate of sourcing from non-approved EU farms: 10.9% of total animals used, compared with 5.5% in the UK and 5% in Germany.
The growing use of non-human primates (NHPs) – 2/3 of which have been used for toxicological or regulatory purposes since 2015 – also poses an ethical problem, as noted by the European legislator in one of the recitals of the European Directive (recital 17).
France is the country using the most NHPs in the European Union: 3,746 in 2017, compared with 3,569 in the UK and 3,472 in Germany.
Between 2015 and 2017, in France, the rate of mild class procedures fell steadily (-32% in 3 years), while the rate of severe class procedures increased by 86% over the 3 years; the same is true, to a lesser extent, of moderate class procedures (+30%). France is well ahead of all EU member states for the number of animals used in severe class procedures (17.1% in 2017 vs. 5.6% in the UK and Germany), which means that our European neighbors know how to do things “differently”, even though their scientific research has nothing to envy to ours.
