After five years, a host of global stars, a series of eye-catching demonstrations and noisy direct action protests, Bristol University has announced its scientists will not be conducting any more of the controversial ‘forced swim tests’.
The University did not say that it was stopping conducting the tests because of the relentless campaign of protests against it, or because it concluded it was unethical, but university bosses said it would not carry out more forced swim tests because the research project into stress which used them was coming to an end.
The tests involve dropping a mouse or rat into a container of water which it can’t escape from or touch the bottom. The animal will frantically try to escape and have to tread water or try to float to stop themselves drowning. The University of Bristol said the test was used by its researchers to understand the neurobiology of stress.
The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), which co-ordinated a huge international campaign against the University of Bristol, applauded the university for ending the tests.
The campaign against them involved a range of different protesting tactics. A steady stream of celebrities, including Bristol University alumni, wrote to the university demanding the tests be dropped – that included everyone from Hollywood actress Anjelica Huston and Dame Joanna Lumley to famous university alumni including actors Mark Rylance and Will Poulter. There were also various stunts around the university and around Bristol to raise public awareness of the tests – including several backed by West of England metro mayor Dan Norris.
PETA even offered to make a donation to the University of Bristol if it would agree to drop the tests – which the uni turned down. Within the university itself, students also protested – and several times disrupted high-profile events where the university’s chief exec and vice-chancellor Prof Evelyn Welch was speaking.
The announcement that the tests would not be continuing defended their use. “The University of Bristol has now stopped using the forced swim test because the research project which used it is due to conclude shortly,” a university spokesperson said. “We are not expecting to undertake any future research which requires the use of the forced swim test.
“Scientific analysis following the use of the procedure in previous research here at Bristol has furthered our understanding of how stress hormones act upon the brain and what their function is. These findings have been published in leading journals like Nature Communications, contributing to a better understanding of the effects of stress at the molecular level. Such insights are crucial for the development of new treatments for stress-related disorders.
“We recognise that the forced swim test has prompted discussions around the ethics of using animals in research. These are important conversations, and we remain committed to open and ongoing dialogue about how and why animals are used in research,” she added.
PETA said the University of Bristol was one of the last few institutions or research organisations to still carry out the test, which it called ‘bogus’. Its campaign against the forced swim test led to a change in guidelines by the Home Office which PETA said would effectively outlaw it anyway – something disputed in the past by the University of Bristol.
“The forced swim test is a bogus experiment that no institution should want to be associated with,” says PETA’s Vice President of Programmes, Elisa Allen. “Terrorising tiny animals in a scientifically and ethically controversial experiment does nothing to advance the treatment of mental health conditions in humans, and we applaud the University of Bristol for backing good science and dropping this horrifically cruel test.”
“The announcement follows a nearly 5-year campaign by PETA, which saw, among other actions, dozens of hard-to-miss protests on campus and across the city and more than 100,000 protest letters from members and supporters, including Dame Joanna Lumley, Sir Mark Rylance, Richard E Grantand Anjelica Huston,” a PETA spokesperson added.
“The University of Bristol was one of the last institutions in the UK still conducting the forced swim test, an experiment that induces panic in small, vulnerable animals by forcing them into inescapable cylinders of water, where they fear they may drown. The animals attempt to climb the steep sides of the container and even dive underwater, desperate to find a means of escape.
“Because the test has long been criticised by the scientific community, the Home Office recently announced its intention to eliminate all uses of the experiment – which would be the first time a specific test on rodents has been banned in the country,” she added.