ASA Adjudication on Europeans for Medical Progress Trust

Ad

A leaflet for Europeans for Medical Progress Trust (EMPT) a charity that campaigned for scientific evaluation of the medical value of animal experiments in drug testing included a quote attributed to Mike Hancock, CBE MP that said: "It is astonishing that animal testing has never been scientifically evaluated and the process is long overdue."

Issue

Pro-Test, a pressure group, challenged whether Europeans for Medical Progress Trust had evidence to support the claim.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

EMPT said the UK Government's position on animal testing was that it had not commissioned or evaluated any formal research on the efficacy of animal experiments and had no plans to do so.  They said the quote attributed to Mike Hancock reflected that.  EMPT said they were aware that Pro-Test had cited three studies that they believed demonstrated that animal testing had been scientifically evaluated.  EMPT believed, however, that the studies had not evaluated the issues scientifically but had looked instead at matters such as legislation, cost benefits and ethics.

Assessment

Not upheld

The ASA considered EMPT had demonstrated that the quote was attributed to Mike Hancock, CBE MP and that it was sufficiently clear that it was a statement of his opinion.  Because we considered the quote was put forward sufficiently clearly as a statement of opinion rather than as a proven fact, we considered readers were unlikely to be misled.

We investigated the ad under CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation), 3.2 (Division of informed opinion), 7.1 (Truthfulness) and 8.1 (Matters of opinion) but did not find it in breach.

Action

No action necessary.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)