22nd October 2015
By Jonathan Webb
Science reporter, BBC News
The Home Office's annual statistics show a 6% drop in animal experiments in the UK - but the office has changed the way it collects these figures.
An EU directive has been adopted that means tests are counted when they conclude, instead of when they begin, making comparisons difficult.
But Home Office staff are "confident" that animal use has, indeed, fallen.
As usual, 50% of the 3.87 million total "procedures" were GM animals, which were created but not used in tests.
That overall figure compares to 4.12 million in 2013. But the Home Office's chief statistician David Blunt emphasised that there was a "discontinuity" between those two figures.
"This means that any comparisons made between 2014 and earlier should be made with caution," Mr Blunt told journalists at a briefing on Thursday.
"The 6% fall is what the data's got, but maybe it's not quite as big as that. But I'm still confident that there's a fall; it may be 3 or 4% or something like that."
Categorising discomfort
Lord Bates, a Home Office minister, said he was "encouraged" to see the number of procedures apparently falling.
"Today's figures indicate the science community continues to respond to the government's firm commitment to adopting measures to replace, reduce and refine animal use," he declared in a written statement.
But the National Anti-Vivisection Society (NAVS) condemned the number of "severe" animal experiments taking place.
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