The Three R’s:  Replacement, Reduction and Refinement
A Conference in Bologna

At the third annual meeting of the World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences that took place in Bologna, Italy from August 29 to September 2, 1999, Christine Stevens – founder and president of the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) was honored with the 1999 Henry Spira Award To Improve The Lot Of Laboratory Animals In Academic Institutions And Commercial Laboratories. AWI worked with the British Universities Federation of Animal Welfare led by Major C.W. Hume to bring about publication of “The Principles of Humane Experimental Technique,” by Russell and Burch.

Throughout the conference, the theme of this book that started the whole movement to replace, reduce, or refine experiments on animals, was cited. Co-author, W.M.S. Russell of the University of Reading, UK, spoke to the assembled conference urging the entire body to energetic action. “The tie I am wearing is a gift from my friend Klaus Cussler, of the Paul Ehrlich Institute. It has about 100 tortoises on it, all moving slowly in the same direction. But one of them is saying, “GET A MOVE ON!” So that is my message to this Congress — let’s get a move on and see how much we can do together to achieve the 3 R’s revolution by the time we next meet in Boston in 2002.”

Hugh Richardson of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre praised Russell and Burch’s “Seminal book” and reported that “by the middle of the 1980s the Council of Europe had adopted a convention based on the three R’s and that the EEC had passed a major new Directive….Directive 86/609 is binding on all the member states of the European Union which have now adopted their own legislation to meet or surpass the minimum standards it lays down. Representatives of the Member States meet regularly with the Commission to discuss ways of improving the application of the Directive in promoting the 3 R’s throughout the European Union.” For example, in February the European Commission approved three in vitro replacements for laboratory animals in toxicity tests: one to test corrosives, another to test photo toxicity, and the third a topical toxicity test. Toxicity tests are the most urgently needed for replacement of animals because they are generally extremely stressful and painful.

Valerie Stanley of the Animal Legal Defense Fund, known for her pioneering victories for animals in court cases, accepted the award for Mrs. Stevens and read her statement to the conference, as printed here:

“I am happy to accept this award on behalf of Christine Stevens. She has asked me to read her remarks:

“I wish to express my gratitude to this 3rd World Congress. I have long admired the work of European Centre for the Validation of Alternative Methods (ECVAM) for its dedication, energy and commitment to find and implement tests that supplant the cruel methods of testing on animals that have been used for so many years.

“With all the resources the United States has, all of its wealth not only in terms of money, but in intelligence and innovation, in terms of finding and implementing non-animal tests, the United States cannot even begin to compare with the genuine strides and accomplishments of ECVAM and its allies such as the Multicenter Evaluation of In-Vitro Cytotoxicity (MEIC).

“In this regard, ECVAM and the American Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods (ICCVAM) are more than worlds apart geographically. In the United States, we seem more interested in stating that we are dedicated to finding non-animal methods than in actually producing and validating them. If pharmaceutical and household product manufacturers in the United States are really serious in pressing forward with the necessary research, why haven’t we made breakthroughs that equal MEICs?”

But the U.S. is seriously behind the more enlightened research community in Europe. Our commitment to Henry Spira’s great legacy in furthering elimination of unnecessary animal testing must not falter.