Gill Langley

Gillian Rose Langley (born 1952) is a British scientist and writer who specializes in alternatives to animal testing and animal rights. She is a member of the Replacement Advisory Group of the British National Centre for the Three Rs, founded by David Sainsbury, and was from 1981 until 2009 the science director of the Dr Hadwen Trust, a medical research charity."Gill Langley: Profile, The Guardian, accessed 9 June 2010. She was a member of the British government's Animal Procedures Committee for eight years, and has worked as a consultant for the European Commission, and for animal protection organizations in Europe and the United States.Levinson, Ralph and Reiss, Michael J. (eds) Key Issues in Bioethics: A Guide for Teachers. RoutledgeFalmer, p. 175. 
Langley is the author of Vegan Nutrition (1988), and editor of Animal Experimentation: The Consensus Changes (1990). She has written a number of reports for the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection and the European Coalition to End Animal Experiments, including Faith, Hope & Charity? An Enquiry into Charity-Funded Research (1988), and Next of Kin (2006), an examination of primate experimentation.
==Education==
Langley obtained an MA in physiology, cell biology, and zoology at the University of Cambridge, then gained her PhD in neurochemistry, also from Cambridge. She took up a position as a research fellow at the University of Nottingham, specializing in neurophysiology in cell culture.
==Involvement in animal protection==
Langley was herself an animal researcher who decided to campaign professionally against animal experiments.Bryan, Jenny & Clare, John. Organ Farms. Carlton, 2001. excerpt She was a member of the Animal Procedures Committee for eight years, which advises the British Home Office on issues related to animal testing, and has acted as an advisor to the government on the introduction of the new European Union chemicals legislation, REACH. She has served as a specialist consultant for the European Commission and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). She was called as an expert witness in 2001 by the House of Lords Select Committee on Animals In Scientific Procedures during its inquiry into animal experimentation in the UK."Examination of Witnesses (Questions 382-399)", Select Committee on Animals In Scientific Procedures, United Kingdom Parliament, retrieved 15 July 2006.
In April 2006, she was a member of the panel at the Oxford Union that debated whether "This house would not test on animals." Opposing the motion were Laurie Pycroft—who founded Pro-Test, which organized the debate—Sir Colin Blakemore, Professor John Stein, and Professor Lord Robert Winston.Asthana, Anushka. "Pro-Test in support of animal experiments", The Observer, 30 April 2006. Supporting the motion, along with Langley, were Dr Andrew Knight, Uri Geller and BUAV campaigns director Alistair Currie.Alistair Currie's speech to the Oxford Union, BUAV, retrieved 15 July 2006. The motion was defeated by 273 to 48.
===Position on animal research===
Langley is an anti-vivisectionist and vegan. She told The Guardian that she "would never claim that all animal experiments are without scientific value,"Burch, Druin. "The sceptic", The Guardian, 2 March 2006. but argues that what she sees as the scientific flaws in animal experimentation and the ethical case against it constitute a case for its immediate abolition. She also argues that the legislation supposed to protect the 2.7 million animals currently used each year in the UK is inadequate, and that more money should be invested in developing alternatives, such as in-vitro and clinical studies. She told the BBC: "When you know that other animals can feel pain and distress in the same ways that humans do, it is unethical to experiment on them.""Reduce animal testing, Lords urge", BBC News, 24 July 2002. She argues that because the British government's budget for alternatives is subdivided into different areas, what each area receives is barely enough to fund one research project.Nature 417, 684-687; 2002.
She is particularly opposed to the use of non-human primates in xenotransplantation, where pig organs are grafted onto the necks of primates to test anti-rejection drugs. She told medical journalists Jenny Bryan and John Clare that the primates used in xenotransplantation research are subjected to major surgery; internal haemorrhages; isolation in small cages; repeated blood sampling; wound infections; nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea because of immunosuppressant drugs; kidney or heart failure, and eventually death. She said: "It's not just the suffering they endure in the laboratories and research establishments. Just getting there can be torture. Studies of primates show them to have complex mental abilities which may increase their capacity to suffer. Supplying the laboratories in the UK imposes huge suffering on the animals... They're then contained in small, single cages, and transported for very long distances causing deaths, distress and suffering."
===Next of Kin===
Langley's report, Next of Kin (2006),Langley, Gill. 
"Next of Kin: A Report on the Use of Primates in Experiments", British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, June 2006, accessed 9 June 2010. was published simultaneously with the publication by the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust in favor of primate experimentation. The New Scientist writes that her report cites studies suggesting that macaques and other small monkeys are more conscious of themselves and others than was previously believed, giving them a moral status equivalent to that of great apes, who are currently not used in experiments in the UK.Coghlan, Andy. "Report claims experiments on monkeys are vital", New Scientist, 2 June 2006. Also see "Primates in Medical Research", Medical Research Council. David Morton, professor of Biomedical Science & Ethics at the University of Birmingham, said the report was "a wake-up call to scientists to raise their game in their justification and ways they use non-human primates in research.""MP to chair BUAV / Pro-Test debate on primate testing", 31 May 2006.
==Publications==
*Next of Kin: A Report on the Use of Primates in Experiments, British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection and European Coalition to End Animal Experiments (ECEAE), 2006.
*Vegan Nutrition. The Vegan Society, 1988. ISBN 0-907337-18-X
*Animal Experimentation: The Consensus Changes. MacMillan, 1989. ISBN 0-412-02411-X
*"Plea for a Sensitive Science" in Animal Experimentation: The Consensus Changes. MacMillan, 1989
*Acute Toxicity Testing Without Animals, ECEAE, 2005.
*Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals - A Non-animal Testing Approach, Green Party, 2004.
*"Chemical Safety & Animal Testing: A Regulatory Smokescreen?", ECEAE, 2004.
*The Way Forward: Strategy for a Future Chemicals Policy, (Part 1), Part 2, ECEAE, 2004.
* The case against the use of animals in medical experiments in Levinson, Ralph and Reiss, Michael J. (eds.) Key Issues in Bioethics: A Guide for Teachers, pp. 167–174. Taylor & Francis Group 2004 ISBN 0-203-47286-1 (e-Book).
==Notes==
==Further reading==
*British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, accessed 9 June 2010.
*National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research, accessed 9 June 2010.
*Examination of Witnesses (Questions 382-399), Select Committee on Animals In Scientific Procedures, accessed 9 June 2010.
*Interview with Gill Langley, Today, BBC Radio Four, 7 September 2004, accessed 9 June 2010.
*Animal research is poor science, Peter Tatchell interviews Gill Langley on Talking with Tatchell, accessed 9 June 2010.
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Category:Animal rights advocates
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