World Day for Animals in Laboratories

 

Today, 24 April, is World Day for Animals in Laboratories, a day to reflect on the continuing use of animals in research, testing and education, to learn and to act.

Many people will have seen this week’s expose by Animal Aid and Animals International of two toxicity testing laboratories in the UK. The images are hard to look at, but investigations such as these are essential to remind everyone that animal testing still happens in most countries, and to spur momentum to end it.

As the organisations say: “The procedures filmed are not isolated cases, they are standard toxicity testing practices authorised by the UK Home Office. Each year in the UK hundreds of thousands of animals are used for such tests for regulatory purposes. This includes toxicity testing of pharmaceutical drugs, as well as industrial chemicals, pesticides, biocides and substances added to food or feed products. Most of these tests are carried out to fulfil overseas regulatory requirements.”

(If you are a UK resident, there is a simple form you can use to contact your Member of Parliament calling on them to demand an urgent end to animal-based toxicity testing).

Exposing cruelty to animals used in research – cruelty that is often legal and licensed – is important, and we commend brave investigators and whistleblowers who bring this to light. According to Tracks Investigations, the last UK toxicity testing investigation was at Wickham Labs in 2009, and the last UK animal lab investigation was in 2013, at Imperial College London, highlighting the significance of this new expose.

At Lush Prize, we have previously awarded prizes for undercover investigations – in 2022 to Carlota Saorsa for her investigation at Vivotecnia laboratory in Spain, and twice to SOKO Tierschutz – in 2015 for its expose of the Max-Planck-Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Germany, and again in 2020 for its investigation at the Laboratory of Pharmacology and Toxicology, Germany.

Since Lush Prize launched in 2012, we’ve awarded Public Awareness prizes to organisations from Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, China, Japan, France, USA, Chile and other countries, all working to highlight ongoing animal use in laboratories.

It’s also important to highlight the amazing advances in non-animal research technologies that we have seen over the 14 years of Lush Prize – such as the organ-on-chip models and computational toxicology projects that have won our Science Prize; the researchers we have funded to train other scientists in non-animal methods, including replacing animal use in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ukraine and Iran; and the 85 Young Researchers we have funded to help them continue careers in ground-breaking science that avoids animal use. We have also funded 15 projects around the world that work with policy makers to change legislation to end animal research and testing and replace it with more human-relevant science.

World Day for Animals in Laboratories is a day to think about the millions of animals still languishing in laboratories worldwide, but at the same time let’s be encouraged by the vision of ending animal research and testing and celebrate all the activists, investigators and scientists working to achieve that goal.

Lush Prize has so far awarded almost £3 million to support these global projects, and in under three weeks time we will be celebrating and rewarding another group of amazing individuals and organisations at the Lush Prize 2026 Awards Ceremony. You can join us too as the event will be live-streamed – check our website for more information closer to ceremony on 12 May.

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24 April 2026