PART III
20. It has long been recognised that there may be an accrued stress when a series of techniques is imposed upon an individual animal. The Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 (ASPA) addresses the impact of severity of procedures performed on research animals. It recognises this principle and aims to balance the accrued "cost" to an individual animal against the potential benefits of the research in determining if the procedure may be allowed. However, this Act specifically excludes procedures which are "recognised veterinary, agricultural or animal husbandry practice". Hence, if cloning by nuclear transfer were to become part of commercial agricultural practice, this protection would not exist. Yet it is obvious that cloning, and other such technologically advanced procedures, provide situations in which, in commercial agricultural practice, an individual animal's welfare may be severely impaired. FAWC has long taken the view that controls similar to ASPA are required to provide adequate protection to farmed livestock which are subjected to such procedures outside the current controls of that Act. The Agriculture (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1968 provides some protection for farm animals by making it an offence to cause, or knowingly to allow, livestock to suffer unnecessary pain or unnecessary distress whilst they are on agricultural land. However, there is a need for new procedures to be analysed and approved before they are used commercially.
21. From our ethical considerations, we concluded that the objections to the use of cloning by nuclear transfer were not such as to rule it out completely if there were sufficiently profound expectable gains and if the costs to the animals involved were light. We therefore went on to consider the circumstances under which this technology may be implemented and the implications for animal welfare. Many of the procedures, for example, the recovery of embryos from superovulated ewes and further laparotomy, are surgical in nature and as such require veterinary input or supervision. Others may involve heavy loss of life, perhaps due to birth abnormalities or longer term effects of the ageing of DNA. We now examine these in detail.