3Rs Alternatives in Sweden
Research funding, etc.
The Swedish Fund for Research Without Animal Experiments (www.stifud.se) has funded research for replacement alternatives to animal experiments since 1970. Today, the Fund allocates about 1 250 000 SEK per year for such research.
The Swedish Government has funded 3Rs alternatives research since 1980. During 2004-2007 is was organized by the Swedish Animal Welfare Authority. Until 2006, the Animal Welfare Agency has had a budget of at least 15 million SEK per year for funding 3Rs research. An additional 1 million SEK has been provided by AstraZeneca. For 2007, only 5 million SEK was allocated for research into alternatives. From 1 July 2007, the responsibility to fund 3R:s alternatives was moved to the National Board of Agriculture (www.sjv.se). From 2009 the task of funding 3Rs alternative will move to the Swedish Reseach Council (Vetenskapsrådet) and the budget allocated is 13 million SEK per year.
The Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet), www.vr.se) serves as the scientific community’s policy organ in issues related to animal experiments and is very much involved in research in the area of Laboratory Animal Science.
Links on animal experiments and 3Rs alternatives in Sweden
Links to websites with some information available in English:
www.stifud.se/english/index.php(The Swedish Fund for Research Without Animal Experiments)
http://www.codex.uu.se/codex_eng/codex/oversikter/djur/djur.html(The Swedish Research Council and Uppsala University)
Information about ongoing projecs in the Nordic countries is awailable at the Fincopa ( the Finish Platform) website:http://www.uta.fi/jarjestot/fincopa/overview.htm