Switzerland: the initiative to end animal experimentation has succeeded

The Swiss will vote again on animal testing. The initiative for a future without animal experiments has passed the milestone of 100,000 certified signatures, the association behind it said on Monday.

More than 100,000 initials were collected until the end of last week in favor of this text, according to the press release from the Community of Interests Initiative for the Ban on Animal Experimentation CH. They must be formally submitted to the Federal Chancellery by mid-November, specifies the initiative committee.

Enough excess signatures will still be collected by then, in case the Federal Chancellery controls the signatures more strictly, after the discovery of falsifications during previous collection campaigns, further indicated the Community of Interests. The latter itself says that it collaborated with the company Incop, which is suspected of having cheated during signature collection.

Four similar initiatives already rejected

The popular initiative calls for animal experiments as well as the breeding and trade of animals intended for such experiments to be prohibited by an amendment to the Federal Constitution. Since 1985, the people have rejected four popular initiatives aimed at banning animal testing to varying degrees, the latest in 2022 by more than 80%.

In 2022, the number of animals used in experiments rose to nearly 586,000, an increase of 2%; those used for experiments that cause significant pain were also increasing, by 5%, notably for research on cancer and neurocognitive diseases.

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