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INSIGHTS: Is banning testing on dogs and cats the key to making animal research more ethical in Canada?

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By Dr. Udo Schüklenk

Udo Schüklenk is a Professor of Philosophy at Queen’s University and the Ontario Research Chair in Bioethics.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s plan to outlaw scientific testing on dogs and cats has delighted pet owners across the province. But his proposal, announced in the wake of an Investigative Journalism Bureau report that raised questions about research design and animal care in a London research facility, is ethically flawed.   

People hold all sorts of animals as pets; it’s unclear what animals will ultimately be protected by his legislation, if it comes to pass. Yet the Premier singled out higher order animals to save from lab cages, citing his own pets as family members. But then, in the same sentence, he kicks mice and rats and rabbits under the bus. Yet thousands of Canadians keep rats as pets. Is a dog superior to a rat or a rabbit? 

Let’s take a step back to understand why certain species of animals are used in clinical research. In drug development, for instance, animals are typically used for experimental agents that have never been tested in humans. Before the toxicity of such drugs is tested in humans, animals whose bodies react somewhat similarly to our own are exposed and observed. The ethical rationale here is to reduce risk to humans. It is unlikely human volunteers would step forward to spare, say, dogs used for this research purpose.   

How do ethicists like me view species selection when it comes to scientific research? A cornerstone principle is justice: we should treat equal things equally. This principle has far-ranging consequences; it explains why, for instance, slavery is viewed as unethical.

It also challenges our traditional understanding that the use of animals in research is ethically acceptable. If animals can feel pain somewhat comparably to how humans do, the principle of justice would give us a reason to stop inflicting pain on them, similar to how we would not grab newborns and subject them to grueling experiments. That would apply to a rat just as it does to a dog or a cat. 

But why not limit the application of the principle of justice to people only? What could justify this? Some have argued that reciprocity can’t be expected of animals, and so we don‘t morally owe them anything. The problem with this view is that a lot of people are also unable to reciprocate. Newborns and people with neurocognitive disorders, for instance, cannot reciprocate, and yet we owe them respect. We don’t see their inability to reciprocate as a reason to set justice aside. 

An unbiased approach to justice makes it hard to limit its scope only to people; it should be applied to non-human animals too.  

Ford’s “pet” standard to animal justice is evidently absurd. Whichever animals we arbitrarily define as pets would benefit unfairly over others that we unjustly discriminate against. Similarly absurd is the contradiction with legislation Ford’s government passed in 2022 that allows hunting dogs to be let loose on penned animals, including coyotes. Yet coyotes are as highly evolved as Ford’s pet dogs. 

This contradiction aside, Canada’s rules regarding the treatment of non-human animals are significantly weaker than in other jurisdictions. That explains why reportedly 16,000 dogs were used in research studies in Canada in 2023 compared to a much more research intensive place like the European Union, where less than 9000 dogs were used that year. I suspect the picture is similarly bleak with regard to lower-order animals.   

With regard to Ford’s planned legislation, there are other foreseeable consequences. Research ethics requires researchers select the animal model that involves the lowest possible level of evolutionary development (mice instead of dogs, for instance, worms instead of great apes). If Ford’s legislation comes to pass as it is currently reported, it is likely that future research will resort to using animals at a higher level of cognitive development such as, for instance, primates. After all, Ford doesn’t have a primate as his pet at home, so primates could be out of luck.  

We must also not forget that Ontario isn’t an island. Prohibiting this research here will simply mean that our province is less attractive for clinical researchers. They will vote with their feet and move their research elsewhere. Nothing is gained, even from Ford’s perspective, unless his view is ‘out of sight out of mind’. If the overall number of ‘pet’ animals isn’t reduced by his legislation, because more of the same research would occur elsewhere, it’s a pointless legislative effort.  

The actual scandal seems to be obvious. The 3 R’s of animal research (to replace, reduce and refine the use of animal models) are violated on a grand scale in Canada.   

Alternatives include cell, tissue and organ cultures, deployment of mathematical modelling, and the use of databanks to reduce duplication, among others. At this point in time none of these efforts can completely replace animal models for research purposes. That doesn’t mean that the use of animals can and shouldn’t be reduced, and Canada clearly has some ways to go to achieve that objective. However, unless you are willing to forgo human health benefits clinical research brings you should not support Ford’s legislation. 

The public uproar over animal research should be taken not as a call to ban such research, but rather as a call to revamp animal care regulations. The aim should be the three R’s, with a view to developing alternatives to the use of pain sensitive animals for clinical research purposes. Given the staggeringly disproportionate number of dogs, for instance, that are reportedly used for research in Canada, policy makers and academics have their work cut out for themselves.  

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