An Estimate of the Number of Animals Used for Scientific Purposes Worldwide in 2015

Abstract

Few attempts have been made to estimate the global use of animals in experiments, since our own estimated figure of 115.2 million animals for the year 2005. Here, we provide an update for the year 2015. Data from 37 countries that publish national statistics were standardised against the definitions of ‘animals’ and ‘procedures’ used in the European Union (EU) Directive 2010/63/EU. We also applied a prediction model, based on publication rates, to estimate animal use in a further 142 countries. This yielded an overall estimate of global animal use in scientific procedures of 79.9 million animals, a 36.9% increase on the equivalent estimated figure for 2005, of 58.3 million animals. We further extrapolated this estimate to obtain a more comprehensive final global figure for the number of animals used for scientific purposes in 2015, of 192.1 million. This figure included animals killed for their tissues, normal and genetically modified (GM) animals without a harmful genetic mutation that are used to maintain GM strains and animals bred for laboratory use but not used. Since the 2005 study, there has been no evident increase in the number of countries publishing data on the numbers of animals used in experiments. Without regular, accurate statistics, the impact of efforts to replace, reduce and refine animal experiments cannot be effectively monitored.