31 October 2023 , 11:56
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Will Young urged viewers to sign a petition against animal testing as he appeared on Sky News on Tuesday.
The Evergreen singer, 44, was "shocked" to find out that up to 2,000 dogs in the UK are tested on every year and made the decision to work against the cruel method of testing. Appearing on the channel on Tuesday morning, Will explained what happens to the animals when they're tested on.
"I found out a couple of years ago to my shock, and I think maybe the viewers will be shocked too, is that still up to 2,000 dogs in the UK are tested on a year," Will, who started fighting for animal rights to raise awareness and be a voice for them, said. "So I drove up to this place which is a legal puppy farm called NBR acres and handcuffed myself to the gates.
"And because I just thought people really need to know about this. I was so shocked. And the more I've looked into it, we don't need to be doing these tests on dogs. They're called 'secondary species'. In fact, there was a World Conference in Toronto about three months ago, where representatives from the big pharma companies, who are normally seen as the baddies, AstraZeneca, Pfizer stood up and said, 'We don't want to do these tests on secondary species' and dogs fall under that remit.
Will spoke about the horrors on animal testing he learned about (Sky News)"There's much better non-animal testing methods now which are scientifically more accurate." He went on to explain how many people excuse animal testing as they believe it helps people's health in the long term. Will continued: "Actually, it's over 90% of the tests they do on animals when it gets human trials, they fail. So, you know, that's not great... there's a 10% pass rate.
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"If that was your driving instructor, you'd go somewhere else, you know. With non-animal testing methods, over 90% pass, they go on. So I'm launching a petition, asking for the immediate ban of testing on dogs. You're a dog lover, I'm a dog lover. And I've seen the conditions that those dogs are in and by the way, the kinds of things that they do to those dogs.
"They don't just send them out to over 120 Labs including universities. They bleed them out for the whole of their lives. On site. They harvest them for their blood, known pet, no painkillers, you know, it's pretty monstrous. And the worst thing about it is it's just not needed because these non-animal testing methods are so much better so much quicker."
Will urged viewers to sign the petition (and share it) to gain the government's attention that "we're a nation of animal lovers" that have no tolerance for animal testing.