Target: Shabana Mahmood, Home Secretary of the United Kingdom
Goal: Order an immediate audit of any dog-based gene therapy trials and, if welfare or licensing breaches are found, impose maximum penalties and suspend further animal use until full compliance is verified.
A London-listed biotech entered confidentiality agreements with large animal-health companies while running a beagle aging trial. Though company statements claim “no safety problems so far,” the use of beagles in experimental gene therapy can involve procedures that include repeated handling, confinement, injections, sedation, and invasive sampling—conditions that can cause fear, pain, and distress for highly social dogs. These concerns intensify when commercial expansion is being pursued behind closed doors while sentient animals shoulder the risks.
Under U.K. law, research involving dogs requires rigorous justification and tight controls. Yet secrecy around this work and its commercialization raises urgent questions about whether every safeguard is actively being met in practice—not just on paper. Surprise inspections, transparent non-technical summaries, and welfare audits are essential to ensure animals are not subjected to unnecessary suffering or corners cut to accelerate timelines.
An immediate, independent review is needed. Sign below to demand inspectors substantiate any breach of licensing conditions or animal-welfare standards and, if confirmed, bring the strongest available sanctions including license suspensions or revocations, fines, and criminal charges where warranted. Humane, lawful science demands nothing less.
PETITION LETTER:
Dear Home Secretary Mahmood,
A biotech firm has pursued anti-aging gene therapy work using beagles while striking confidentiality agreements with major animal-health companies. Even if framed as routine research, dog-based gene trials can involve procedures that may cause significant stress, pain, and fear—especially when repeated sampling, sedation, or confinement are involved. The public deserves confidence that every legal and ethical safeguard is being upheld at all times.
We respectfully urge you to direct the Animals in Science Regulation Unit to conduct an immediate, unannounced audit of any current dog-based gene therapy projects, verifying actual on-the-ground welfare conditions, harm–benefit analyses, anaesthesia/analgesia protocols, housing, enrichment, endpoints, and staff training. Please also require rapid publication and plain-language clarification of non-technical summaries so the public can understand what is being done to these dogs and why.
If inspectors find any non-compliance—with license conditions, welfare rules, or the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act—we ask that you impose the maximum penalties available in law, suspend further dog use until full compliance is independently verified, and consider referring any serious violations for prosecution. These beagles cannot speak for themselves; robust oversight and meaningful consequences must speak for them.
Sincerely,
[Your Name Here]
Photo credit: Ruth Ellison
