LONDON: British scientists are genetically modifying and cloning hundreds of thousands of animals a year with little health or commercial advantage, according to a report by genetics monitoring group GeneWatch.

The great majority of the 582,000 animals genetically altered in Britain in 2000 for medical or agricultural research were mice, but increasingly sheep, goats, cattle, pigs, rabbits, birds, poultry and cats are being used. The scale of the genetic experimentation on animals was previously unknown and shocked the RSPCA and other animal welfare groups.

But the report, which drew on peer-reviewed scientific studies and patent applications made by companies, was condemned by leading scientists as “irresponsible”.

The report, which covers the development of GM animal technologies worldwide, says that many experiments are highly inefficient, wasteful of animal lives and frequently involve suffering.—Dawn/The Guardian News Service.