Abstract
The German Federal Administrative Court recently announced an order (finalized on January 20, 2014) on the neurobiological experiments on primate brains of Prof. Kreiter at the University of Bremen. With this order, a preceding court decision by the Higher Administrative Court of Bremen was established as final and absolute and the last glimmer of hope to end the suffering of the primates in Bremen was extinguished. The court decision had claimed the experiments to be ethically justified. The Federal Administrative Court upheld the court decision and issued the order on the grounds that due to the phrasing of both the former and the current German Animal Welfare Act, authorities had no entitlement to assess the ethical justification of an experiment, but were obliged to approve an application if all formalities were complied with. The impact the order will have on the authorization of animal experiments and testing in Germany caused an outrage in the animal welfare community.
Highlights
After the order of the German Federal Administrative Court1 became public, the German Animal Welfare Federation took immediate action and both addressed the competent German Federal Minister, demanding a revision of the German Animal Welfare Act, and appealed to its own members to withdraw their participation in committees advising competent authorities on the evaluation of proposed projects involving animal experiments in Germany (Beratende Kommissionen; “ethical review committees”)
Directive 2010/63/EU2 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the protection of animals used for scientific purposes was transposed in the third amendment of the German Animal Welfare Act (Tierschutzgesetz; TierSchG) of July 4, 20133 and the resulting new Regulation on the protection of animals used for scientific purposes of August 1, 20134
We demand that Germany is held accountable for these shortcomings if the German Federal Government does not initiate a revision of the German Animal Welfare Act
Summary
After the order of the German Federal Administrative Court became public, the German Animal Welfare Federation took immediate action and both addressed the competent German Federal Minister, demanding a revision of the German Animal Welfare Act, and appealed to its own members to withdraw their participation in committees advising competent authorities on the evaluation of proposed projects involving animal experiments in Germany (Beratende Kommissionen; “ethical review committees”). The curtailment of the right to evaluate the ethical justification of a project involving animal experiments for authorization by the competent authorities is not the only failure of the German Federal Government to transpose Directive 2010/63/EU correctly. We demand that Germany is held accountable for these shortcomings if the German Federal Government does not initiate a revision of the German Animal Welfare Act. In this article, we would like to highlight the shortcomings of the German Animal Welfare Act in terms of the correct transposition of Directive 2010/63/EU and explain the reasons for our decision to end our participation in ethical review committees
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