Jump to: 1959 1960-1969 1970-1979 1980-1989 1990-1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008
Russell and Burch publish The Principles of Humane Experimental Technique, which introduces the principle of Refinement (one of the Three Rs—Reduction, Replacement, Refinement).
First edition published of what later came to be known as the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals.
AALAC (Association for Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care) established to evaluate quality of animal care in laboratories.
Public Law 89–544, Federal Laboratory Animal Welfare Act (LAWA) enacted.
LAWA amended to include mammals and birds; renamed Animal Welfare Act (AWA).
NIH issues first Policy on Care and Treatment of Laboratory Animals.
Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) Act enacted for quality of care assurance regarding testing related to Food and Drug Administration policy requirements.
1981
Johns Hopkins Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing (CAAT) founded.
April: First conference on animal pain in the United States sponsored by AVMA and FASEB: "Pain perception in animals."
Report of the AVMA/FASEB conference on "Pain perception in animals" published in the International Journal for the Study of Animal Problems.
Animal Welfare Act amended to mandate Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees (IACUCs) and greater attention to pain and distress.
Health Research Extension Act enacted.
Public Health Service Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals revised (establishment of IACUCs).
Public Law 99–198, Food Security Act, Subtitle F-Animal Welfare enacted to improve laboratory standards.
Morton & Griffiths publish landmark paper on scoring the adverse impacts of experimental procedures on animals.
Public Health Service implements the Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals.
May: AVMA Conference: "Colloquium on Recognition and Alleviation of Animal Pain and Distress."
Proceedings of the AVMA Conference appear in JAVMA 191: 1184–1296.
APHIS proposes new regulations involving categorization of pain and distress.
Final rules for Animal Welfare Parts 1 & 2 enacts more of the definitions and regulations made in the 1985 AWA amendments.
APHIS withdraws 1987 proposed pain and distress categories following a directive from the Office of Management and Budget.
Final rule for Animal Welfare Part 3 in order to enact certain 1985 AWA amendments.
Institute for Laboratory Animal Research/National Research Council publishes Recognition and Alleviation of Pain and Distress in Laboratory Animals.
National Institutes of Health Revitalization Act requires government to develop alternative models of toxicity testing.
Cornell conference focuses on the science and technology of pain and distress assessment and alleviation.
Dialogue group (four animal protection and four animal research representatives) formed by Tufts Center for Animals and Public Policy writes to USDA suggesting that USDA revise its pain/distress reporting system.
April 14: APHIS/USDA Policy #11: (Painful/Distress Procedures) issued (intended to minimize or prevent procedures that cause animal discomfort, distress and/or pain).
April 14: APHIS/USDA Policy #12: (Consideration of Alternatives to Painful/Distressful Procedures) issued (requires investigators to consider using alternatives to painful and distressful procedures).
Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods (ICCVAM) formed to increase acceptance of alternatives.
The Humane Society of the United States launches its Pain and Distress Campaign.
CAAT, NIH, and ILAR sponsor workshop: "Pain Management and Humane Endpoints."
November 2–3: National Academy of Sciences meeting: "Animal Welfare Perspectives on Pain and Distress Management in Research and Testing."
November 23: Zeist, The Netherlands conference: "Humane Endpoints: Animal Welfare Perspectives."
March 13–14: Scientists Center for Animal Welfare/American Association for Laboratory Animal Science conference regarding IACUC issues.
March 21–23: Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research conference: "Putting Ethics into Action: The Costs of Caring and Complying."
August 29–September 2: Third World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences.
December 6–7: Scientists Center for Animal Welfare conference on Animal Research and IACUC Issues.
Proceedings of the International Conference: (held November, 1998 in Zeist, The Netherlands) Humane Endpoints in Animal Experiments for Biomedical Research published.
March 13–14: Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research conference: "IACUCs: The Ethics, the Politics, and the Reality."
April 27: HSUS press conference challenges scientists to end research-animal pain and distress by 2020.
May 18–19: Scientists Center for Animal Welfare conference: "Pain, Distress and Stress in Research Animals: Current Standards and IACUC Responsibility."
May 21–24: American College of Laboratory Animal Medicine conference: "Laboratory Animal Medicine: Advancing Science and Animal Welfare in the 21st Century."
June 21: USDA issues a revised Policy #12: Consideration of Alternatives to Painful/Distressful Procedures.
June 22: Institute for Laboratory Animal Research workshop: "Definition of Pain and Distress and Reporting Requirements for Laboratory Animals."
June 24: Canadian Council on Alternatives to Animal Research conference.
July 10: USDA Federal Register announcement: Docket Number 00–005–1, Animal Welfare, Definitions for and Reporting of Pain and Distress.
August: USDA extends deadline for public comments on Docket Number 00–005–01 regarding pain and distress.
September: Federation for American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) formally opposes the USDA proposed rule regarding pain and distress.
November: OECD publishes Guidance Document on the Recognition, Assessment and Use of Clinical Signs as Humane Endpoints for Experimental Animals Used in Safety Evaluation.
Proceedings of the ILAR Conference published: Definition of Pain and Distress and Reporting Requirements for Laboratory Animals
ICCVAM Authorization Act establishes ICCVAM as an official government body.
November 6: The HSUS submits comments on Docket Number 00–005–1 regarding pain and distress.
Proceedings of the PRIM&R Conference (held in March 2001) published: IACUCs: The Ethics, the Politics, and the Reality.
October 14: AVMA holds animal welfare forum, "Pain Management."
October 23: SCAW and WARDS hold seminar at AALAS conference, "Recognition of Pain and Distress by Animal Care Staff."
November 14: Press release regarding public opinion on pain and distress in animal research released by The HSUS.
January: Lab Animal publishes moderated debate, "Pain and Distress in Research Animals: A Panel of Experts Debates the Issues." The HSUS contributed to this piece.
February: University of Connecticut agrees to pay the largest fine ever paid by a research facility ($125,000) for a settlement with the USDA in regards to multiple Animal Welfare Act violations, in addition to a $4,500 fine for violating a 1999 stipulation with the agency. Several violations pertained to pain and distress issues, including inadequate husbandry and veterinary care and improper post-operative care, resulting in animal suffering.
February: Johns Hopkins Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing funds research for measuring and minimizing painful rodent procedures.
May: The HSUS submits testimony regarding appropriations to support research programs that alleviate pain and distress in laboratory animals.
June 6: Nature publishes a letter to the editor from The HSUS regarding the need for increased attention to and knowledge of pain and distress issues.
July 17: NIH issues guidance notice regarding carbon dioxide euthanasia.
August: Workshop regarding pain and distress assessment held at Fourth World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences.
P.A. Flecknell and J.V. Roughan produce a CD-ROM entitled, "Pain Assessment in the Rat."
Proceedings from the AVMA forum on pain management published.
2003
February: Presentation regarding The HSUS Pain and Distress Campaign given at the first alternatives conference in India.
March: Presentation regarding The HSUS Pain and Distress Campaign at Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research conference.
April: The HSUS submits testimony regarding appropriations to support research programs that alleviate pain and distress in laboratory animals.
June 5: CAAT holds workshop on pain and distress alleviation and identification.
September 16–20: Eighth World Congress on Veterinary Anesthesia held; September 17 designated as "Pain Day."
September 17: Inaugural meeting for the International Veterinary Academy of Pain Management (IVAPM) held at the World Congress on Veterinary Anesthesia.
October 14: First-ever web cast from American Association for Laboratory Animal Science (AALAS) conference: Pain Assessment and Alleviation—Telling It Like It Is.
2004
February 11-13: The HSUS sponsors Workshop on the Definition, Recognition and Alleviation of Animal Distress Operational Definition of Distress
March: The HSUS submits testimony to the Senate Committee on Appropriations requesting that $2.5 million of the FY 2005 Budget for improving methods for recognizing, assessing, and alleviating pain and distress in research animals.
March 2: Lawsuit filed by the Animal Legal Defense Fund, the Animal Welfare
Institute and three individuals that claimed that the USDA failed to properly implement standards to "promote the psychological well-being of primates" is dismissed in court.
May 12: The AWEN Group, Inc. and the Ohio Scientific Education and Research Association hold seminar Assessment and Treatment of Pain and Distress in Animals
July: The HSUS publishes a paper in Alternatives to Laboratory Animals
regarding the Pain and Distress Campaign.
August: The HSUS writes a letter to the Secretary of Defense encouraging non-animal alternatives to the use of live goats in harmful U.S. Army wounding exercises.
August 27: The U.S. Department of Agriculture issues a formal complaint against the University of California, San Francisco for dozens of alleged violations of the Animal Welfare Act resulting in unnecessary animal pain and distress.
October: The HSUS goes public with its campaign challenging Allergan, Inc. regarding the use of painful, deadly animal testing of Botox® Cosmetic.
October 19-25: Annual Meeting of the American College of Veterinary Anesthesiologists (ACVA) and the International Veterinary Academy of Pain Management (IVAPM)
HSUS analysis of laboratory animal science conferences suggests increased attention to pain and distress issues by the research community due to number of sessions and workshops devoted to these issues
The American Association for Laboratory Animal Science adds a course on pain recognition and alleviation to their Learning Library.
A report entitled "A Cross-Species Approach to Pain and Analgesia" , resulting from a workshop held by the Mayday Fund in 2002, is published in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association.
A gorilla named Koko communicates tooth pain to her caretakers through American Sign Langauge
Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing establishes a "humane endpoints" database.
Wisconsin National Primate Research Center (WNPRC) announces it will be more precise in reporting animal pain and distress to the federal government, as its researchers adhere to a more rigid clarification of distress.
2005
January: The HSUS participates in a four-day meeting of the Interagency
Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods (ICCVAM) on eye irritancy testing.
March: The HSUS expresses its concerns to the Department of Defense regarding the development of pulsed energy projectiles (PEPs) and the suffering and harm these weapons cause to animals in testing.
HSUS' Pain and Distress Report reaches over 3,000 subscribers.
April: The HSUS submits comments to the National Institutes of Health regarding pain and distress concerns associated with xenotransplantation.
A paper authored by The HSUS regarding concerns with carbon dioxide euthanasia is published in Laboratory Animals.
June: The HSUS is notified that its recommended language was incorporated
into a new bill on chemical testing.
The HSUS sends a letter to and urges the USDA to move forward on its five year-old proposal to define distress and improve the categorization system.
July 16-20: International Veterinary Academy of Pain Management (IVAPM) sponsors approximately 40 lectures and two wet labs at the 28th World Veterinary Congress/American Veterinary Medical Association annual meeting.
August: The HSUS presents a poster on the Pain and Distress Associated with Polyclonal Antibody Production and distributes this new publication at the Fifth World Congress on Alternatives in the Life Sciences in Berlin, Germany.
The HSUS gives a presentation on distress at the Fifth World Congress on Alternatives in the Life Sciences.
August: Bert van Zutphen, Ph.D., professor emeritus of Utrecht University in the Netherlands, is bestowed the Russell and Burch Award for advancing alternatives in the life sciences.
August 20-21: Working Group on Humane Endpoints coordinates Second International Conference on the Use of Humane Endpoints in Animal Experiments for Biomedical Research
November 7: The European Union and trade associations from the pharmaceutical, chemical, cosmetics, and biotechnology sectors issue a "3 R's Declaration," establishing a voluntary partnership aimed at refining, reducing, and replacing animal use in product testing.
The American Association for Laboratory Animal Science (AALAS) recognizes that "obtaining greater knowledge on eustress, stress, pain, and distress is critical to the enhancement of the welfare of laboratory animals" on their website
An internal audit of the United States Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service's enforcement of the Animal Welfare Act reveals concern that Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees are not effectively monitoring mandated activities such as reviewing painful and distressful procedures and searching for alternatives.
2006
February 9: The AWEN Group coordinates Third Annual Assessment and Treatment of Pain and Distress in Animals Conference.
The US Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods announces plans to host an expert workshop on alternatives to the LD50 Test for assessing the potency of Botulinum toxin-based products such as Botox® Cosmetic—prompted by concerns revealed by HSUS.
April: The Institute for Laboratory Animal Research holds a public meeting on animal distress as part of the update to its 1992 report, Recognition and Alleviation of Pain and Distress in Laboratory Animals, to be divided into two reports: stress and distress and pain.
The HSUS submits testimony to the Senate Committee on Appropriations requesting $2.5 million of the FY 2007 Budget for improving methods for recognizing, assessing and alleviating pain and distress in research animals.
July 6-7: The Institute for Laboratory Animal Research holds second committee meeting on animal distress as part of the update to its 1992 report Recognition and Alleviation of Pain and Distress in Laboratory Animals, to be divided into two reports: stress and distress, and pain.
September: Report of the Working Group on Animal Distress in the Laboratory is published in Lab Animal (working group meeting hosted by The HSUS and sponsored by Kenneth Scott Charitable Trust).
September 6-8: The Institute for Laboratory Animal Research holds final committee meeting on animal distress as part of the update to its 1992 report Recognition and Alleviation of Pain and Distress in Laboratory Animals, to be divided into two reports: stress and distress, and pain.
October 25: The HSUS runs a full-page ad in the New York Times under the title “Shouldn't Science Do Better?,”noting that 40 years had passed since passage of the AnimalWelfare Act and that much remained to be done to address public concerns about the use of animals in research, testing, and education.
November: The US Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods hosts an expert workshop on alternatives to the LD50 Test for assessing the potency of Botulinum toxin-based products such as Botox® Cosmetic—prompted by concerns revealed by HSUS.
December 8: The HSUS ran a full-page advertisement in the New York Times on under the title "How Could We?," calling attention to the plight of chimpanzees U.S. labs and efforts to end harmful experimentation on them.
2007
February 9: The AWEN Group coordinates conference entitled Establishing Next Best Practices
May: The National Institutes of Health announces it will no longer fund the breeding of chimpanzees for research, sparing some chimpanzees up to 60 years in a laboratory and signaling the government’s desire to move away from chimpanzees as a research model, and move towards more cost-effective research.
August 21-25: The HSUS gives three presentations relating to pain and distress at the Sixth World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences.
August: Rodger Curren, Ph.D., is bestowed the Russell & Burch Award for advancing alternatives in the life sciences.
September 4: The Institute for Laboratory Animal Research holds the first committee meeting on animal pain as part of the update to its 1992 report Recognition and Alleviation of Pain and Distress in Laboratory Animals, to be divided into two reports: stress and distress, and pain.
October: An HSUS representative participates in a Humane Endpoints Working Group hosted by Tufts University Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine.
November: The HSUS submits comments to USDA regarding possible revisions to the Animal Care Policy Manual.
November 27: The HSUS submits a shareholder resolution to Allergan, Inc. asking for disclosure of the company’s current activities and future plans to eliminate the animal-based LD50 test from the manufacturing process of Botox and Botox Cosmetic. Every batch of Botox is tested to see the amount that will kill 50% of the animals dosed, with death usually resulting from suffocation.
December 6: The HSUS and the Procter & Gamble Company launch AltTox.org, a new website to support the advancement of non-animal methods in toxicity testing.
December: President George W. Bush signs The Chimp Haven is Home Act, closing the loophole in the CHIMP Act of 2000 that allowed for the possible return to laboratories of chimpanzees in the federal sanctuary system.
December: The Institute for Laboratory Animal Research publishes new book Recognition and Alleviation of Distress in Laboratory Animals.
December: New Jersey becomes the second state to adopt legislation prohibiting traditional animal experimentation for product testing when federally recommended alternatives exist.
The Animal Welfare Accountability Improvement Act, which would prohibit the use of live animals for sales demonstrations of medical devices and increase fines for research institutions that violate the Animal Welfare Act is passed by the U.S House of Representatives.
The National Research Council of the National Academies releases “Toxicity Testing in the Twenty-first Century: A Vision and A Strategy,” that contains a landmark statement that testing should move away from a reliance on decades old animal tests. An HSUS representative served on the report committee.
The HSUS and Procter & Gamble (P&G) award the 2007 North American Animal Welfare and Alternatives Awards to Professor Elaine Faustman from the University of Washington for her research into the development of in vitro systems for the evaluation of a variety of environmentally and occupationally relevant agents, and Dr. Patricia Turner from the University of Guelph, for her contribution to the education and training of veterinarians in laboratory animal medicine at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
2008
January: Citing animal welfare violations, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) orders the University of Connecticut Health Center to return $65,000 in federal grant money that financed research on how the brain controls eye movements.
February 8: The HSUS co-sponsors a conference coordinated by the AWEN Group entitled Humane Endpoints: Where Science and Animal Welfare Meet conference, where The HSUS is a sponsor.
If you have any questions or comments about the information in this timeline, please e-mail The HSUS Animal Research Issues Section at ari@hsus.org.
Updated February 22, 2008 
