Japan has finally agreed to end all drift net fishing, by the end of 1992, and to accept the UN resolution placing a ban on drift net fishing in the North Pacific by June; NS (7 Dec 1991), 13. South Korea is expected to follow suit, as is Taiwan. Iceland has decided to withdraw from the International Whaling Commission in mid 1992, but it may not resume whaling in 1992. They are calling for the establishment of a new international organisation to regulate whaling. The International Whaling Commission may have to decide this year whether they will look at both ethical and ecological concerns about whaling.
A report by the U.K. group Advocates for Animals, cites papers from the MRC that involved monkey experiments; Nature 354: 177; NS (23 Nov 1991), 15. Of 60 experiments examined, they claim 13 should not have been allowed in the U.K. meanwhile, in the U.K. Charities have joined the calls to justify animal tests, Times (12 Nov 1991); Lancet 338: 1264; Nature 354: 100. A series of papers on monkey behaviour is in Laboratory Animal Science 41 (August issue). The social interactions of primates have ethical implications, though they focus on the benefits of social living for laboratory monkeys.
A review of Colin Tudge, Last Animals at the Zoo (Hutchinson Radius 1991, 266pp., 17) is in Nature 354: 195-6. This book is against zoos in general and thinks that they will not be very useful for conservation in general. See also a letter in Nature 354: 10. A review of A. Johnson, Factory Farming (EEIN 1: 75) is in NS (7 Dec 1991), 53. On the topic of animal research see a review, M.J. Matfield, "Animal liberation or animal research?", TIPS 9: 411-5; FASEB J. 5: 2888-92. On animal rights see letters in Nature 353: 788, 354: 101; Science 254: 176; BMJ 303: 1137; NEJM 325: 1580-4; on extremists see NS (23 Nov 1991), 11; Science 254: 1099.
On animal testing and alternatives such as cell-based assays see TIBTECH 9: 407-8; on the Dr Hadwin Trust see SCRIP notes (Dec 13), 26; Chemistry & Industry (2 Dec 1991), 863. These comments look at alternatives, and are somewhat of a contrast to the many articles which are to be found in medical journals which focus on the benefits of animal research with a conflict theme.

France has announced that it intends to establish a monkey farm to breed animals for scientific experimentation; NS (8 Feb 1991), 18. A study on monkey behaviour is in NS (4 Jan 1991), 25-9. On whether humans and monkeys see the same things see TINS 15: 1-3. It appears that chimpanzees have very diverse behaviour; Science 255: 287-8. This is shown in the tool use, hunting and social patterns, and such data is consistent with an elevated status for chimpanzees (not excluding relative species) in discussions of animal rights.
As mentioned in the last issue (EEIN 2: ), there are claims by a UK croup, Advocates for Animals, that unnecessary animal experiments have been conducted in the UK under the Animal Procedures Act regulations; NS (8 Feb 1991), 18. The members of the UK Animal Procedures Act Committee are listed in BME (Dec 1991), 8. There is also mention of the UK list of about 20,000 names on the police animal rights extremists file. Also in the UK, the Agricultural and Food Research Council is sending all its related laboratories copies of new guidelines on animal research; Nature 355: 100.
A Federal court in the USA has said that the USDA animal regulations should not exclude rats, mice and birds, saying that such exclusion was "arbitrary and capricious"; Nature 355: 191. It is expected that the USDA will modify its regulations to include these animals, which will increase its workload, but it will make the regulations more consistent. Letters on the use of animals in medical education are in JAMA 266 (1991), 3421-3. There may not be a real need for the use of many live animals in education, and reductions could be made without jeopardizing the education of medical students.
On reducing the number of toxicity tests performed on animals see BMJ 303 (1991),1494-5. Recent international standardisation of tests in USA, Europe and Japan will avoid duplication of tests and will reduce the number of animals used by about a third. They also agreed to half the length of long term studies. These efforts will save the use of animals and costs, hopefully the money saved may be spend on looking at other risks to human health that are currently neglected.
On February 14 a bill in the UK Houses of Parliament to ban fox hunting was narrowly defeated, by 12 votes; Guardian (15 Feb 1991), 2. The sponsors of the bill have said that they intend to continue the fight, and it appears that the days of fox hunting in Britain may be coming to an end given the level of public support for a ban on it; Newsweek (2 Dec 1991), 27.
Australia has said that it was an insult that Japanese whaling vessels caught whales offshore of the Australian Antarctic Davis base. One of the ships was cutting up the carcasses of 3 whales. One would think that after all the "scientific studies" of whales that the Japanese vessels conduct, they would have learnt about the anatomy of whales by now.

A referendum to halt all animal experiments in Switzerland has recently been held, and it was rejected, by 56% to 44%. Only 4 cantons had an accepting majority, but a more extreme initiative is being processed and will be voted on in the future (Dr Alex Mauron, Fondation Louis Jeantet de Medecine, P.O. Box 277, 1211 Geneve 17, Switzerland); NS (22 Feb 1991), 5.
A proposal for a system for ethical analysis of animal experiments is presented in D.G. Porter, "Ethical scores for animal experiments", Nature 356: 101-2. Scientists are called on to take on the Schweitzerian ideal of doing no harm, and to use the tension between this ideal and practice to judge whether animal experiments are ethical. Eight categories are used, two based on the nature of the experiment and six based on pain and the viewpoint of the animal. It is a very useful practical paper and pleasing to see it appear in a major scientific journal after the publication of numerous defenses of animal experiments based solely on the simplistic arguments of the benefits of animal research to science. Some improvements could be made to the scoring system, but hopefully such a system will cause scientists to debate the issue and to design more ethical experiments.
The use of animal experiment guidelines in the USA , to temporary close down one laboratory accused of unethical animal treatment, while inspectors could examine it, is debated in Nature 356: 3. At the beginning of the year, a US court judged that mice, rats and birds should not be excluded from the protection given to research animals under the US Animal Welfare Act of 1971; Science 255: 539. Animal rights extremists continue to burn selected laboratories in the USA; Science 255: 1349, and a review of the book The Animal Rights Crusade: The Growth of a Moral Protest, J.M. Jasper & D. Nelkin (NY: Free Press 1991, 214pp., US$23) is in Science 255: 1448-50.
A Christian critique of animal rights is presented by O.R. Barclay, "Animal rights: a critique", Science & Christian Belief 4: 49-61. The term animal rights is rejected in favour of the idea of responsibilities to, and duties to, animals and the whole of creation. A paper debating whether killer whales should be held in captivity is B. Obee, "The great killer whale debate. Should captive orcas be set free?" Canadian Geographic (Jan/Feb 1992), 20-31.
A series of discussion papers on animal rights and biotechnology is available from the Center for Biotechnology Policy and Ethics, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843-4355, USA.

Discussing the alternatives to animals for toxicity testing see Chemistry & Insdustry (16 March 1991), 207-11. It argues for the use of non-animal testing based on reliability and cost, though the development of the alternatives was based on ethical motives. On reducing the numbers of animals, and changing from LD50 test to fixed-dose tests see Nature 357: 432.
A series of articles on animal rights and experiments is in New Scientist , some items include; researchers fear (4 April 1992), 29-32; the UK Animal Procedures Act, which is supported by scientists but has some difficulties in practice (4 April 1992), 25-8; role of ethical committees (11 April 1992), 24-7; unethical experiments, p. 28-30; the benefits of animal experiments (18 April 1992), 30-31; the definition of what is a necessary experiment, p. 32-4; do animals feel pain? (25 April 1992), 30-33, stressful life for laboratory animals, p. 34-6; the use of laboratory rats (2 May 1992), 29-30, revising toxicity tests, p. 31-3; the antivivisection debate from Advocates for Animals (9 May 1992), 28-30, dissecting animals in the classroom, p. 31-5; the possible reduction in use of laboratory rats in united Europe due to common standards for toxicity (16 May 1992), 29-31, the US situation for animal experiments, p. 32-6; Victorian values and the history of animal rights (23 May 1992), 28-31, a review of New Scientist articles on animal experiments, p. 32-5. It is commendable that they publish so many articles on the debate, and it is time that alternatives are speedily adopted.
Although several US universities have removed animal laboratories and dissections from their medical schools, and many let students be exmepted if they ethically object to such experiments, the Uniformed Services University of the Health Services, for military training, has said it will not exempt students from performing animal experiments even if they have moral or religious reasons against it; Nature 356: 554. Letters on animal rights appear in Nature 356: 651; 357: 187. The terrorist activities of the Animal Liberation Front are discussed in JAMA 267: 2577--8, together with several bills in the US Congress.
Of relevance to animal behaviour is the ability that animals have to recognise individuals, and a paper on the visual processes of recognition in monkeys is M.P. Young & S. Yamane, "Sparse population coding of faces in the inferotemporal cortex", Science 256: 1327-31. A book review of K. Pryor & K.S. Norris, Dolphin Societies is in Science 256: 681-2. A treaty protecting dolphins in the Baltic and North Sea has been signed by Britain recently, NS (16 May 1992), 8. There is also a cheap method being developed to keep dolphins out of fishing nets; NS (11 April 1992), 18. We must await the results of the International Whaling Commission meeting the beginning of July in Soctland, for decisions on the future of whaling; Nature 357: 350. In Japan, many politicians gathered to eat Whale meat at a protest meeting in June; Japan Times (23 June 1992), 3, there is little awareness that whales may be more sentient than pigs or cows, though they make us question where we draw the line on our human centred spoecies ladder.
A book review of S. Budiansky, The Covenant of the Wild: Why Animals Choose Domestication, is in Nature 356: 487. It argues that animals chose to be in farms as part of the natural evolutionary relationship between species. A letter on animal well being is Nature 356: 556.
The use of injectable contraceptives for wild horses that suffer from overpopulation, delivered by gun, is reported in Science 256: 1390. The idea is that the population will be stablised and it will avoid the "need" to kill animals by shooting.

In Britain there is pressure to ban the import of primates ; Nature 358: 7. This is intended to stop the wild killing and capture of primates, but may also damage some captive breeding programs in developing countries. On the other side of the debate, comments on a US letter and card campaign aiming at thanking medical researchers for the results of experiments is in Nature 357: 530. Academics in Britain also want to make proexperiment publicity and the issue is being debated at the BMA meeting; BMJ 304: 1526; 305: 1.
A more philosophical discussion is T.L. Beauchamp, "The moral standing of animals in medical research", Law, Medicine & Health Care 20: 7-16. He says that almost no philosophical progress has been made in the last 20 years in the area of animal status. Another article is E. Schroten, "Embryo production and manipulation: ethical aspects", Animal Reproduction Science 28: 163-9. Of relevance to the status of animals is T.M. Caro & M.D. Hauser, "Is there teaching in nonhuman animals?", Quarterly Review of Biology 67: 151-74. It calls for broadening of the definition of teaching to observe various social behaviour that occur in animals that may be relevant. Several book reviews of interest are in Ethics (July 1992), 890-1; also NS (25 July 1992), 46-7.
Norway and Iceland have said that they will resume Whaling next year, while Japan and Russia may use "scientific allocations" to allow some hunting; NS (11 July 1992), 12-13; Financial Times (30 June 1992), 9; EEIN 2: 48. A review on the issue is D.S. Butterworth, "Science and sentimentality", Nature 357: 532-4.

Two months ago the patient who had a baboon liver transplant died, but the question of whether animal organs should be used for humans was raised more vocally. A paper on this is J.L. Nelson, "Transplantation through a glass darkly", HCR (Sept.-October), 22: 6-8. See also In Keeping with the Trends (St Joseph's College Catholic Bioethics Centre, Edmonton, Canada, newsletter - October 1992). A positive view for xenotransplantation, based on the shortage of human organ donors, and an attempt to develop ethical guidelines is in Transplantation Proceedings 24: 722-7. Meanwhile a pig liver transplant was performed in the USA, intended as a temporary liver, but the patient died within two days (see organ transplants section).
The process of learning and intelligence is a complex subject. A study on one of the mechanisms underlying this is reported in J. Hart Jr & B. Gordon, "Neural subsystems for object knowledge", Nature 359: 60-4. They present a study of one patient whose responses suggest a difference between visually based and language based representations of meaning. Knowledge of physical properties appears to be segmented from knowledge of other properties in the language system. A book review of Donald Griffin, Animal Minds (University of Chicago Press, 320pp., US$25) is in Newsweek (28 Sept 1992), 54. It considers the need to redefine what we call consciousness when we consider whether animals are conscious . A book review of J.S. Kennedy, The New Anthropomorphism, is in Nature 359: 280; and a review of a book looking at the historical uses of horses and donkeys in society is in Nature 359: 279. A letter on egg production is in Nature 359: 472.
A letter on the whaling issues, and responding to a commentary in Nature over the IWC is in Nature 359: 9. The new law in the USA making animal rights terrorism a federal crime is summarised in Science 257: 1048. Another report of interest to bioethics and animal research is in Nature 359: 98; where a researcher has been ordered to disclose details of an unfunded research grant application that had proposed rhesus monkey experiments to an animal welfare group, in Washington state; violating the researchers privacy of ideas - when the proposal has not been funded.
Meanwhile the French Supreme Court of Appeals has upheld the use of animals in biomedical research and fined activists for stealing baboons; Nature 359: 259; Lancet 340: 841-2. In Britain the animal research procedures have been strengthened to force regular reviews for procedures involving researchers over the age of 65 years, following earlier reported abuses; Nature 359: 262. It is also likely that training periods for all researchers who want to use animals will be required. The relationship between scientists and animals is the subject of a new book, The Inevitable Bond: Examining Scientist-Animal Interactions, ed. H. Davis & D. Balfour, (Cambridge University Press 1992, 45, 399pp), reviewed in NS (26 Sept 1992), 44.
Australian attitudes to desexing dogs and current practices in Queensland are reported in an abstract No. 66 in the abstracts from the 84th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Animal Science in J. Animal Science Supplement 1, 1992.

A letter on the humane treatment of animals, and caged hens is in Nature 360: 100. The number of animals used for experiments in the UK in 1991 are reported in NS (14 Nov 1992), 12; see also NS (31 Oct 1992), 10. Protests in Holland about killing animals at a research center that run out of funds are reported in NS (31 Oct 1992), 5. On the program of the French government to lower violent acts by animal rights extremists see BMJ 305: 1246 (EEIN 2: 76). An editorial on the transplant of a baboon liver performed in Pittsburgh (EEIN 2: 75) is in Medical Ethics Advisor 8 (Sept 1992), 100-3.
A report on questioning in a US Supreme Court case on the constitutionality of a ban on religious or ceremonial animal sacrifices is in Washington Post (5 Nov 1992), A3. A review of the philosophy of animal rights is R.P. Vance, "An introduction to the philosophical presuppositions of the Animal Liberation/Rights Movement", JAMA 268: 1715-9. The review focuses on the arguments of Singer and Regan, though is basically against them and defending animal experiments.
A review of D.R. Griffin, Animal Minds, is in Nature 360: 118-9. Some interesting comments on chimpanzee sex, are in Lancet 340: 1201. Pygmy chimpanzees may regard sex, and enjoy it, in a way similar to humans. Research on the brain mechanism of fear is discussed in Science 258: 887-8. On pain mechanism see a conference review in Science 258: 1085. A recent study has shown that plants use electrical signals, and can generate action potentials, to send signals after mechanical disturbance; Nature 360: 14-4, 62-5. The signals can stimulate the synthesis of protease inhibitors in other leaves, which could slow down foraging caterpillars.

A recent book discussing the science and ethics of biotechnology, with particular focus on animal rights issues is Michael W. Fox, Superpigs and Wondercorn. The Brave New World of Biotechnology ... and where it all may lead (New York: Lyons & Burford 1992, 208pp. See another review in Biotechnology 11: 180-1. Dr. M. Fox is the Vice President of the Humane Society of America, and is opposed to the utilitarian application of genetic engineering to animals, as well as experiments in general on animals, and a meat-based agriculture. It reports that about 10,000 mice strains have been made for experiments, and is critical of the making of strains which suffer. Another focus of the book is on the commercialisation of biotechnology and the dangers that commercial interests present to the future environment, biodiversity, and our attitudes to life. This second theme will be accepted by most people aware of the potential dangers of technology and the impact it has on people's attitudes. It contains data of interest to support the arguments. The basic view taken is supportive of some applications of plant genetic engineering, but critical of the working philosophy of society which views technology as the cure to the world's problems. On animal patents, see the patent section below.
The USDA law on animal experiment data reporting is under challenge, and proposals are listed in Nature 360 (1992), 503. The USDA data reports 1.8 million animals used in US experiments in 1991, excluding rats, mice and birds! In the UK the Animal Procedures Law requires the recording of the number of animal experiments, and these are published in the Hansard, the government publication. In a recent parliamentary question, (Hansard , 6 Nov, Cols 531-2) it was reported that the number of primates used by the research institute for Chemical and Biological Defence is a defence secret and will not be published. Alternatives to animals that have been developed by biotechnology are in FDA Consumer (Jan/Feb 1993), 15-8.
The mental state of monkeys is reviewed in R.M. Seyfarth & D.L. Cheney, "Meaning and mind in monkeys", SA (Dec 1992), 78-84. A study on the relationship between brain weight and life-span in primate species is in PNAS 90: 118-22. A book review of W.C. McGrew, Chimpanzee Material Culture: Implications for Human Evolution (Cambridge University Press 1992, 277pp., 40) is in Nature 361: 217. The use of medicines by animals, such as plants, may help us discover new medicines, BMJ 305 (1992), 1517-8, 1583. Papers related directly to human thinking are D.L. Schacter, "Implicit knowledge: New perspectives on unconscious processes", PNAS 89 (1992), 1113-7; T.V.P. Bliss & G.L. Collingridge, "A synaptic model of memory: long-term potentiation in the hippocampus", Nature 361: 31-9.
A book review of M.A. Elgar & B.J. Crespi, eds., Cannibalism. Ecology and Evolution among diverse taxa (Oxford University Press 1992, 361pp., US$75) is in Science 258 (1992), 1969-70. Mice appear to be able to recognise their kin, and this may be linked to MHC genes; Nature 360 (1992), 530, 581-3.
Genetic studies are changing the thoughts on the organisation and evolution of whale species, Nature 361: 298-9. The Norwegian view on whale hunting is discussed in Nature 360 (1992), 523. The US Congress voted by 382 to 0 to continue the ban on commercial whaling. The US government may impose sanctions against China, Korea, Taiwan and Yemen because they import black rhino horn; NS (6 Feb 1993), 9. If a country is classified as breaking restrictions on imports of endangered species products that countries exports may be barred from entry to the USA. In the UK, a possible change in definition of "humane" traps by the International Standards Organisation may allow the import of animals caught in leg hold or submersion traps into the UK; NS (6 Feb 1993), 5.