VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – The opening of UBC’s new pharmacy building was met with demonstrators Saturday.

Anne Birthistle with Stop UBC Animal Research doesn’t like what will be going on in there.

“Highly invasive research is being done on non-human primates, and highly invasive work is being done on cats, ongoing work on rats, mice and others species.”

Birthistle argues other methods could be used.

“We’re asking the universities of Canada to implement the alternatives that are already there. With DNA chips we can discover how drugs will work in each individual person. We don’t need to test it on animals.”

But Sanjeev, a former grad, says sometimes that’s not an option. “We do rely in pharmacy on animal testing to realize the safety of certain medications.”

Anthony, who also used to work in the labs, agrees.
  
“Would you prefer to be the first one to try it or would you rather have seen a rat or rabbit or another organism try it so that  we can at least have an idea as to how toxic this compound may be?”

Stop UBC Animal Research points to a 21-month old report by the Canadian Council on Animal Care which found issues with the research program including a lack of animal safety and training.