Companies Transporting Lab Animals
An Animal Rights Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM

Gateway To Hell
March 2014

Whilst most of the lab animals are transported by a few major players, the following airlines are all currently known to either be transporting animals for laboratory purposes or to have transported animals in the past and not yet made a statement.

transporting lab animalsThe transportation of animals is a complicated business, which involves a lot of logistics and a number of factors to move the animals from one side of the world to the other and get them to the laboratory alive. The most obvious of these links in the transportation chain is the airlines, but airlines are also reliant on services, such as ground handlers and airport services, all of whom can refuse to handle animals destined for laboratories.

Across Europe and the US, animals are generally moved by road rather than by air, with hundreds of thousands of animals known to be being shipped across the US in trucks each year. Currently very little is known about these over-ground networks, but many breeders take responsibility for moving their own animals in their own vehicles. However, even when the breeder is providing their own transportation they are still reliant on services, and these services can also be denied to them on moral grounds. Airlines still provide vital transport links for many species however – from wild-caught primates that cannot be moved any other way to delicate amphibians who would not survive a lengthy truck ride.

Cutting off the supply

transporting lab animalsBritish activists have had a lot of success with slowing the trade of laboratory animals in the UK. At present, the ferry services from the UK to Europe are now refusing to let lab animal transports pass, and laboratories are already facing an increase in the cost of lab animals due to other difficulties in shipping them to their final destinations. Airports and ground-handling companies are another important factor that can impact the transportation of animals, with the ground-handlers at Los Angeles airport reportedly refusing to handle animals for China Southern, (which has effectively stopped their monkey transports), and with numerous regional airports also refusing to handle animals these can also be effective regional solutions.

Airlines dealing in animal cruelty

Whilst most of the lab animals are transported by a few major players, the following airlines are all currently known to either be transporting animals for laboratory purposes or to have transported animals in the past and not yet made a statement.

If you are an employee or representative of a company involved in the transportation of animals and you wish to relieve your conscience by providing information about animal transports then click here.

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