Some 450,000 animals bred for animal testing were killed last year because they were surplus to requirements or the wrong sex, according to a new report from the food and consumer product safety authority VWA.



The surplus animals, which cost the animal testing industry €2m, included mice, rats, rabbits, cats, dogs and apes, the report shows.

In total, more than a million animals were bred for use in laboratories in the Netherlands last year.

The number of actual experiments carried out on animals was down slightly on 2007, the VWA said. Some 52% of the experiments were for scientific study and 37% in connection with developing new drugs.