Please sign this petition to tell Government that we want an end to all experimentation on primates!

After more than 20 years there is finally a revision of the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 to be made. There has been no indication of what might be reformed, however  At present over 2500 monkeys are exposed to mortifying unethical scientific experiments that are of no value to humans, and a further 4500 in the EU. If we don't make a change now we may be waiting another twenty years for the opportunity to make a difference, in which time we will have lost a further 50,000 of these beautiful intelligent creatures, in the UK alone.

Primates are exposed to pain and stress from toxicity tests and experiments on brain conditions, which lead to vomiting, diarrhoea, tremors, and unbearable suffering. They are deprived of food and water to manipulate their behaviour, and made to perform repetitive frustrating tasks. They are surgically mutilated and forcefully restrained, and suffer fear and loneliness, particularly as they are sometimes kept alone in captivity for a period of years. Some are killed after a single experiment, while others are subjected to one painful procedure after another. Either way, testing on primates is inhumane and unethical.

There is no equivalent language centre to be recognised in these non-human primates, yet they continue to be used for experiments on Alzheimer's, when there clearly is no benefit. Chimpanzees are usually healthy, and researchers attempt to induce the symptoms of human diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and stroke in them artificially, and they are often deliberately brain damaged through surgery or the use of toxic chemicals. Working with artificially induced symptoms is clearly not the same as working with a spontaneously arising disease in a human. Alzheimer's is characterised by the degradation of thought and language, and there is no way of measuring this in non-humans, and countless treatments for stroke have been developed using primates, and all have, when applied to humans in clinical trials, either failed or harmed. Therefore, where is the justification for inflicting sadistic harm on these defenseless and intelligent animals?

To obtain data applicable to human health, we must focus our resources on human-based medicine and research methods, and there are now a range of rapid, modern and accurate tests, using human cells, tissues and segments of DNA which are processed through rapid screening techniques. In addition 'microdosing' can be used, a method involving tiny amounts of an experimental drug being traced in the human body through radioactive labelling, and there are already established non-invasive imaging methods such as PET and MRI scans, and population studies and post-mortem examinations. These methods need to be taken more seriously and better promoted, and although they may be marginally more costly, they would be a valuable investment into the future of research and healthcare, as well as putting an end to the unnecessary and inhumane primate experiments that are still taking place in a supposedly modern society.

Let's put the suffering of primates to an end!