§ Mr. HancockTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many licences were issued for the animal testing of botulinium toxin in each year since 1997; how many animals were involved, broken down by(a) breed and (b) type; and how much toxin was involved in each case. [181809]
§ Caroline FlintA survey of currently held data indicates that 10 project licences have been granted since 1997 under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986. authorising the use of animals in research and testing involving botulinum toxin. The figures are:
Number of project licences issued 1997 1 1998 1 1999 1 2000–01 0 2002 4 2003 2 2004 (To date) 1 The licensed work has covered safety testing of the toxin for clinical use, research and development as regards possible new clinical applications, research into alternative methods of testing. and forensic food safety checks. None has been connected with publicised use of the substance for non-medical cosmetic purposes.
The animals used for clinical purpose safety testing in 2002 are a subset of those reported at column 1 of table 15 in the publication entitled Statistics of Scientific Procedures on Living Animals in Great Britain 2002 (Command 5886, available in the House Library). This relates to all protected animals used in safety testing of pharmaceuticals—those used for testing botulinum toxin are not identified separately. Although all the testing is undertaken using rodent species, the precise details of the numbers, breed and type are not collated centrally. This is also the case as regards earlier years.
The amount of toxin used varies between testing programmes and studies, but licence authorities mandate only the use of the minimum intended to achieve the scientific objective.