The Problem
The move away from animal testing is long overdue. The science is ready. These are the facts the old system would rather you did not read.
Mice, rats, fish, and other animals are bred and used in testing, teaching, and research across New Zealand. Many are killed. The Forced Swim Test, where animals are made to swim to exhaustion, is one method BAR is helping universities rule out.
Human tissue models, organ-on-chip systems, computational models, and animal-free cell culture already answer questions more reliably than old animal models. An animal-free alternative to Foetal Bovine Serum has entered NZ labs.
The barriers are systemic, not scientific: funding tied to old methods, regulation that assumes animal data, education that trains the next generation on animals, and a divide between researchers and advocates. BAR works on all of them.