Stuttgart (dpa / lsw) – The Greens in the state parliament consider animal experiments in scientific training to be dispensable. They therefore want to significantly restrict experiments with killed animals with an amendment to the law – against the resistance of science and the coalition partner. The fronts are hardened: The Greens refuse to defuse the planned paragraph, which has long been agreed. The CDU sees – like universities – the science location and teaching in danger. The Science Committee wants to discuss the law on Wednesday.
The background: The green-black coalition is currently working on an amendment to the so-called University Law Amendment Act. The Greens want to use this to tighten the rules on animal experiments with a formulation. You want to write in paragraph §30a that the use of killed animals should be dispensed with in teaching, provided that “scientifically equivalent teaching methods and materials are available” or the professional qualification aimed at with the degree allows this. The universities should also develop teaching methods to avoid animal experiments.
Universities are therefore sounding the alarm. The university council of the renowned agricultural university Hohenheim in Stuttgart recently wrote that the paragraph would have a lasting negative impact on the quality of Baden-Württemberg’s university education. With regard to the freedom of research and teaching, this is too far a restriction, the state rectors’ conference criticized in the summer. Animal experiments are currently only permitted after an approval process by the state authorities.
Such a passage would damage the science location Baden-Württemberg further, criticizes the CDU spokeswoman for science policy in the state parliament, Marion Gentes. “Animal welfare in teaching must not go so far that training is impossible.” After all, the development of a vaccine against the coronavirus cannot do without animal testing. A proposed amendment was submitted to the Greens, which provides for an ethical weighing of interests between animal welfare and the necessary training in technical expertise. But the Greens had refused.
Gentges continues to insist on a change in the amendment, even if one does not want to endanger the coalition peace by blocking this green hearted matter, says Gentges.
Science Minister Theresia Bauer does not understand the dispute. “There is no justification for worrying about the freedom of the science location,” says the Green politician. “The leeway is retained, also in teaching.” In future, universities will have to explain more why animal testing should be without an alternative, said Bauer. She doesn’t believe in cruelty-free science. But: “Whether one has to kill an animal in order to understand its anatomy, one can question.”
Animal experiments generally play a major role in the southwest. In a comparison of the federal states, scientists in Baden-Württemberg used the most animals for experimental purposes in 2018, according to statistics published in January by the Federal Ministry of Agriculture (BMEL). The case of the brain researcher Nikos Logothetis caused a sensation, who carried out animal experiments on monkeys in Tübingen for decades before he came under heavy criticism from animal rights activists. In February, the scientist announced that he wanted to conduct research in Shanghai in the future.
The Greens in the state parliament consider animal experiments to be dispensable, at least during studies. At most, there are still a few highly complex areas in which no alternatives are available and in which one has to rely on experiments with animals, says the university expert of the Green parliamentary group, Alexander Salomon. The criticism of the universities is exaggerated, it is neither a danger for the university location nor are courses of study threatened with extinction.
Salomon was surprised at the criticism from the coalition partner. The paragraph was agreed with the CDU a long time ago. It is not about a blanket ban on animal experiments. The new regulation is necessary for those who cannot and do not want to do animal experiments during their studies. And: other federal states have similar regulations.
From the point of view of the animal rights organization Peta, the draft could go even further. There are already many recognized animal-free teaching and research methods, for example lifelike animal models or digital simulations, emphasizes Peta specialist and biologist Anne Meinert. They make animal experiments superfluous and are the future of science. The statements of the University of Hohenheim testified to “backwardness instead of progress”.
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