Few people will be impressed with the University of Brighton’s attempt to justify the animal experiments carried out at its laboratories, for it is utterly unconvincing (The Argus, March 3).

It is now widely recognised that experimenting on mice, rats, guinea pigs and other animals does not provide any reliable guide towards treating human ailments; in fact, misguided reliance on the results of such research has resulted in countless medical disasters involving the maiming and death of many human patients.

A few years ago, the biochemist Dr Tony Lindl and a team of fellow scientists analysed 51 series of animal experiments performed at three German universities and established that 99.7% of the data produced by the researchers was irrelevant to human beings and that no medical use had been found even for the remaining 0.3%.

I suggest that the University of Brighton follows the example of German universities, at least half of which have now recognised the natural differences between humans and other living species, and no longer uses animals in its medical faculties.

Dennis B Stuart, Marine Parade, Brighton