Animal testing of recreational drugs unlikely

Activists across the country have voiced their disagreement after animal testing was mooted as a possibility to ensure the safety of legal recreational drugs.

A report in the Sunday Star-Times raised the issue of LD50 testing a process where a group of dogs or rats are subjected to increasingly potent doses of a drug until half the group dies.

Associate Health Minister Peter Dunne has ruled out the practice in New Zealand calling it barbaric on RadioLIVE but the wider issue of animal testing of recreational drugs still looms large. The Government has made it clear it wishes to see a process set up whereby manufacturers must prove a product is safe before it can be sold, rather than the current process which sees the Government on the back foot and forced to react after it has already hit the market.

Retired politician Pete Hodgson says it is highly unlikely the industry will be allowed to test its products on animals here.

This is a really interesting public policy issue the debate really matters but actually probably f**k all is going to happen, says Mr Hodgson, a former Labour Party MP who spent two years as the Minister of Health and six years as Minister of Research, Science and Technology and now serves as the chair of the Australian and New Zealand Council for the Care of Animals in Research and Teaching, an independent organisation which works within the animal science industry on matters of ethics and social issues.

Nobodys going to bother to put their particular highs through the drug-testing regime that the Governments about to legislate for if the only market they can sell them to is New Zealand. It just aint going to happen."

Dr Leo Schep, a toxicologist specialising in recreational drugs with the National Poison Centre says some form of animal testing needs to be looked at.

You have to challenge these people and say, Do you mean that its quite acceptable for humans to be the first line of testing for these drugs? And of course we know the answer is no. It has to come back to animal testing unfortunately.

Opposition to the ideal has been vocal but Dr Schep says people need to determine where they draw a line.

I know some people may say, Well who cares about recreational drugs, but the bottom line is we care about our society and we protect our society irrespective of what they expose themselves to. Thats the bottom line.

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Animal testing of recreational drugs unlikely