One of the guiding principles of using animals for biomedical research is to use the smallest number of animals that may lead to statistically or biologically significant results. Supporting this concept, both the NIH and USDA state that “investigators may use fewer animals than approved. This does not require IACUC approval, notification, consultation, or administrative handling.”1

Dr. Ed Stark was an established researcher with a propensity for doing things in a way that just skirted the line between right and wrong. This tendency often caused problems for the school’s IACUC, as exemplified by an incident when Stark decided to reduce the number of animals in one of his IACUC approved experiments. He did this by euthanizing an entire group of negative (untreated) control mice without informing the IACUC. When the IACUC office finally found out what Stark had done, the committee chairman asked him for an explanation because Stark had argued during the initial review of his protocol that the untreated controls were scientifically necessary. But now he said that the findings to date with his experimental groups were trending toward strong statistical significance and the vehicle control mice (those having corn oil mixed in their diet) were adequate controls to complete the study. He added that he wanted to avoid some of his per diem charges, so eliminating an unnecessary group of animals made good sense, and in any case the IACUC had no authority to even question him about how he conducted his experiment as long as there was no protocol noncompliance or animal welfare issues.

Stark’s response did not sit well with the IACUC chairman who discussed the incident at the next full committee meeting. The chair’s position was that there was nothing in the protocol that gave Stark the authority to euthanize an entire experimental group of healthy animals that he originally stated were important to his study. On the other hand, he was aware of the NIH guidance about an investigator being allowed to use fewer animals without informing the IACUC1 but he did not interpret that guidance as sanctioning the euthanasia of an entire experimental group just to save money.

How do you think the IACUC should resolve the issues raised by its chairman?