I WONDER if your readers are aware of the number of scientific experiments and tests carried out on dogs in Great Britain?

In 1998 more than 11,000 such procedures were carried out in laboratories in this country.

Many of these are performed on dogs simply because they are trusting and easy to handle.

Dogs do not have common characteristics with humans, so any results cannot even be applied to humans.

People may not realise that dogs are kept in bare enclosures and denied the care and affection they crave while being used to test chemicals, household products and food additives as well as medicines (anyone who remembers the Thalidomide scandal will recall the disastrous result of assuming animals and humans react in the same way to drugs).

As a nation of animal lovers we are badly letting down man's best friend by allowing such atrocities to go on in the 21st century.

If anyone feels this situation is wrong they should write to their MP at the House of Commons, London, SW1A OAA and ask him/her to write to the Home Office and press for an urgent review.

Further information can be obtained from the British Union Against Vivisection, 16a Crane Grove, London, N7 8NN.

Lesley M Bosworth,

Haig Road,

Blackpool.