The objectives of the Lord Dowding Fund for Humane Research are:

• to support and fund better methods of scientific and medical research for testing products and curing disease which replace the use of animals; to fund areas of fundamental research which lead to the adoption of non-animal research methodology; to fund, promote and assist medical, surgical, and scientific research, learning, and educational training and processes for the purpose of replacing animals in education and training.

 

• to promote and assist any research for the purpose of showing that animal research is harmful or unnecessary to humanity.

Founded in 1973, the name of the Fund is in honour of the Battle of Britain’s Air Chief Marshal the Lord Dowding, a President of the National Anti-Vivisection Society. To date, the Fund has awarded grants approaching £2 million to researchers working on a wide range of fields including microsurgery, toxicity testing of dental fillings, breast and lung cancer, product safety testing, Parkinson’s disease, schizophrenia, cot deaths, cataracts, kidney research, cell culture, computer-aided drug design, biotechnology, brain damage, computer teaching packages which replace the use of animals in education of students at school and university level.