Protection of animals used for scientific purposes

In accordance with the requirements of Directive 86/609/EEC, the Commission presents its seventh report on the statistics on the number of animals used for experimental and other scientific purposes in the Member States of the European Union. 

The objective of the report is to present statistical data on the number of animals used for scientific purposes in the Member States of the European Union during the year 2011. The report contains the results of the data collected by all 27 Member States in 2011 with the exception of one (France) which provided data from 2010.

Due to differences in the reporting year and an increase in the number of Member States over the years, the Commission states that it is not possible to draw accurate quantitative conclusions on the evolution of the use of animals for experimental purposes in the EU.

Results: in the EU, the total number of animals used for experimental and other scientific purposes from the data collected in 2011 is just under 11.5 million (with data from France from 2010). This is a reduction of over half a million animals used in the EU from the number reported in 2008 :

·        as found in previous reports, rodents and rabbits account for 80% of the total number of animals used in the EU. Mice are the most commonly used species with 61% of the total use, followed by rats with 14% ;

·        the second most used group of animals was, as in previous years, cold-blooded animals which represent almost 12,5%. The third largest group of animals used was birds with 5.9% of the total use ;

·        as stated in the previous three statistical reports no ‘Great Apes’ were used in experiments in the EU in 2011.

Comparison with previous reports: the report notes that the effect of the inclusion of the data from new Member States since 2005 i.e. Bulgaria and Romania, did not lead to an increase in the total number of animals. On the contrary, a decrease was reported in 2008 and this downwards trend continued in 2011 (by more than 500 000 animals). However, the use of some individual species has increased.

There is a clear increase in the total numbers of five species out of the 25 species reported. For other species a net decrease is observed :

·        the highest increase is noted for fish (310 307) in comparison to 2008 and for rabbits (25 000). For species used in lower numbers (i.e. in the thousands range) there is an increase in the number of animals in the category other carnivores (2 129), horses, donkeys and cross-breds (710) and other mammals (2 184) ;

·        the largest decrease observed in 2011 for the more commonly used species is for rats with a reduction of more than 500 000 animals. In the same range there is also a reduction in the use of mice (122 876). There is also a significant reduction in the use of 'other birds' (more than 85 000) and guinea-pigs (49 401) ;

·        there is a clear decrease in the use of prosimians and non-human primates (-94%).

·        no use of great apes has been reported in EU since in 1999.

The Commission notes that this is the last time that animal use data will be collected in accordance with the requirements of Directive 86/609/EEC. This Directive has been replaced by Directive 2010/63/EU on the protection of animals used for scientific purposes, and the presentation of data has been completely revised with effect from 10 May 2013.