Gill Langley

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Dr. Gill Langley
Dr. Gill Langley

Gill Langley is a British zoologist and writer who specializes in animal rights and animal protection issues in relation to the use of animals in research. She is scientific consultant to the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV) and the Dr Hadwen Trust for Humane Research. She is a former member of the British government's Animal Procedures Committee, a current member of the Replacement Advisory Group of the British National Centre for the Three Rs, founded by Lord Sainsbury, [1] and has worked as a consultant for the European Commission as well as animal protection organizations in Europe and the United States. [2]

Langley is the author of Next of Kin (2006), a report on primate experimentation published by the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection with a foreword by primatologist Jane Goodall; Vegan Nutrition (1995); and editor of Animal Experimentation: The Consensus Changes (1990), a collection of essays on animal research by leading scientists and philosophers, including Mary Midgley.

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[edit] Education

Langley studied physiology, cell biology and zoology for her bachelor's degree at Cambridge University's Department of Zoology, then gained her Ph.D in neurochemistry, also from Cambridge. She took up a position as a research fellow at Nottingham University, specializing in neurophysiology in cell culture.

[edit] Involvement in animal protection

Animal rights

Activists
Greg Avery · David Barbarash
Rod Coronado · Barry Horne
Ronnie Lee · Keith Mann
Ingrid Newkirk · Andrew Tyler
Jerry Vlasak · Robin Webb

Groups/campaigns
Animal Aid · ALF
Animal liberation movement
Animal Rights Militia
BUAV · Great Ape Project
Justice Department
PETA · PCRM · SPEAK
Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty
Viva!

Issues
Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act
Animal rights · Animal testing
Bile bear · Factory farming
Operation Backfire
Speciesism

Cases
Britches
Cambridge University primates
Pit of despair · Silver Spring monkeys
Unnecessary Fuss

Writers/advocates
Steven Best · Stephen R.L. Clark
Gary Francione · Gill Langley
Tom Regan · Richard D. Ryder
Peter Singer · Steven M. Wise

Categories
Animal experimentation
Animal Liberation Front
Animal rights movement
Animal rights

WikiProject
WikiProject Animal rights

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Described in the book Organ Farms as "not what some would regard as a typical animal rights campaigner," [3] Langley was an in vitro researcher who decided to change tack and campaign professionally against animal experiments. She subsequently took up a position as scientific advisor to the BUAV.

She was a member of the Animal Procedures Committee for eight years, which advises the British Home Office on issues related to animal testing, and has acted as an advisor to the government on the introduction of the new European Union Chemicals legislation, REACH. She has served as a specialist consultant for the European Commission and for the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). [1] She was called as an expert witness in 2001 by the House of Lords Select Committee on Animals In Scientific Procedures during its inquiry into animal experimentation in the UK. [4]

In April 2006, she was a member of the panel at the Oxford Union that debated whether "This house would not test on animals." Opposing the motion were Laurie Pycroft — who founded Pro-Test, which organized the debate — Sir Colin Blakemore, Professor John Stein and Professor Lord Robert Winston. [5] Supporting the motion, along with Langley, were Dr Andrew Knight, Uri Geller and BUAV campaigns director Alistair Currie. [6] The motion was defeated by 273 to 48.

[edit] Position on animal research

Langley is an anti-vivisectionist. She told The Guardian that she "would never claim that all animal experiments are without scientific value," [7] and this position is sometimes wrongly interpreted as partial support for animal experimentation. It is not. Her view is that a combination of the many scientific flaws in animal experimentation and the ethical case against it constitute a case for its immediate abolition. She also argues that the legislation supposed to protect the 2.7 million animals currently used each year in the UK is inadequate, and that more money should be invested in developing alternatives, such as in-vitro and clinical studies. She told the BBC: "When you know that other animals can feel pain and distress in the same ways that humans do, it is unethical to experiment on them." [8] She argues that because the British government's budget for alternatives is subdivided into different areas, what each area receives is "barely enough to fund one research project." [9]

She is particularly opposed to the use of non-human primates in xenotransplantation, where pig organs are grafted onto the necks of primates to test anti-rejection drugs. She told medical journalists Jenny Bryan and John Clare that the primates used in xenotransplantation research are subjected to a large number of traumatic procedures and their effects, such as major surgery; internal haemorrhages; isolation in small cages; repeated blood sampling; wound infections; nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea because of immunosuppressant drugs; kidney or heart failure; and eventually death. [3] She said: "It's not just the suffering they endure in the laboratories and research establishments. Just getting there can be torture. Studies of primates show them to have complex mental abilities which may increase their capacity to suffer. Supplying the laboratories in the UK imposes huge suffering on the animals... They're then contained in small, single cages, and transported for very long distances causing deaths, distress and suffering." [3]

[edit] Next of Kin

Langley's report, Next of Kin (2006), was published simultaneously with the publication [10] by the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust in favor of primate experimentation. [11] She argues that monkeys suffer the same kind of pain, anxiety and anticipation as human beings would if placed in the same situations. In the press release accompanying the publication David Morton, professor of Biomedical Science & Ethics at the University of Birmingham, calls it a "wake-up call to some scientists to raise their game in their justification and ways they use non-human primates in research." [12]

Langley told New Scientist: "It’s not that they are so much like us they shouldn’t be experimented on. It comes down to pain and suffering. Like humans, they know the pain is coming, they remember pain and are susceptible to non-physical pain, suffering anxiety if they’re isolated socially from other monkeys." [11] Langley says that there is "no halfway house": "We can argue about the science forever, but what I’ve never heard is any clear scientific explanation for moral discrimination." The New Scientist states that her report cites studies suggesting that macaques and other small monkeys are more conscious of themselves and others than was previously believed, giving them a moral status equivalent to that of great apes — currently not used in experiments in the UK.

[edit] Publications

[edit] See also

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b Langley, Gill. "Next of Kin: A Report on the Use of Primates in Experiments"PDF, British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, June 2006.
  2. ^ Levinson, Ralph and Reiss, Michael J. (eds) Key Issues in Bioethics: A Guide for Teachers. RoutledgeFalmer, p. 175.
  3. ^ a b c Bryan, Jenny & Clare, John. Organ Farms. Carlton, 2001. excerpt
  4. ^ "Examination of Witnesses (Questions 382-399)", Select Committee on Animals In Scientific Procedures, United Kingdom Parliament, retrieved July 15, 2006.
  5. ^ Asthana, Anushka. "Pro-Test in support of animal experiments", The Observer, April 30, 2006.
  6. ^ Alistair Currie's speech to the Oxford Union, BUAV, retrieved July 15, 2006.
  7. ^ Burch, Druin. "The sceptic", The Guardian, March 2, 2006.
  8. ^ "Reduce animal testing, Lords urge", BBC News, July 24, 2002.
  9. ^ Nature 417, 684-687; 2002.
  10. ^ "Primates in Medical Research"PDF
  11. ^ a b Coghlan, Andy. "Report claims experiments on monkeys are vital", New Scientist, June 2, 2006.
  12. ^ "MP to chair BUAV / Pro-Test debate on primate testing", May 31, 2006.

[edit] References

[edit] Further reading

[edit] Audio

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