General public has great acceptance of experiments on animals

During autumn 2024, the Swedish Research Council carried out a survey of the general public’s attitude towards experiments on animals. The survey company Ipsos helped us to put the questions to just over 1 000 persons, a representative sample of Sweden’s population.

More than half, 54 per cent, accept experiments on animals in medical research. More in-depth follow-up questions show that 74 per cent accept animal experiments in some contexts. If it is also known that the animals are treated well and not exposed to unnecessary suffering, as required by law, acceptance increases to 82 per cent. This shows that the issue of experiments on animals is complex.

67 per cent have great or very great trust in researchers to comply with legislation and regulations for animal protection.

At the same time, the survey indicates that knowledge about experiments on animals is fairly low. Only half know that experiments on animals were used when developing vaccines against COVID during the pandemic. Furthermore, the majority do not know who to turn to to get answers to questions about experiments on animals.

Today, some experiments on animals can be replaced by alternative methods, but animal-free methods to replace all types of experiments on animals are still lacking. For this reason, experiments on animals continue to be an important tool in medical research today. Experiments on animals are also important for the animals own welfare.

“Experiments on animals affect and engage many people, and it is important for the Swedish Research Council to be aware of people’s attitude on issues that are debated. The report is part of our work on maintaining a factual discussion about laboratory animal issues,” says Madeleine Durbeej-Hjalt, Secretary General of the Scientific Council for Medicine and Health.

Read the report "Allmänhetens syn på djurförsök 2024" (in Swedish)