Lab Animal Kingdom

In connection with laboratory experiments on animals, we most often encounter two standpoints in the media: those seen to be for or against scientific progress, the former despite the cost in animal victims, the latter despite the cost in human terms of reducing animal experimentation. The documentary Lab Animal Kingdom chooses a different viewpoint on "guinea pigs" as a point of conflict between animal lovers and technology. The adoption of the REACH regulation, which requires testing for harmfulness of products, is a challenge for scientists. How can they ensure product safety for humans without causing other living organisms to suffer? We will look into a white kingdom of sterility; the laboratories full of microscopes, robots, screens, chemical glassware, and animals for testing, where the research workers’ efforts lead to a desirable reciprocal proportion: the more rapid progress that is made in the field of alternative laboratory methods of research (e.g. the use of synthetic leather, computer simulation of functioning human organs), the less there is a need for experimenting on animals. While we have to wait for their complete replacement with a “biological robot”, the documentary tries to convince us that science doesn't ignore the ethical questions about the trauma and pain of laboratory animals. (Academia Film Olomouc)