Ch. 15— Institutional and Self-Regulation of Animal Use • 345 
first site visit. Current application fees range from 
$1,050 to $1,650, depending on the size of the fa- 
cility, and annual fees range from $600 to $900. 
A A ALAC uses the NIH Guide for the Care and Use 
of Laboratory Animals as its primary standard for 
evaluating facilities and programs. In addition, the 
association recommends these sources about lab- 
oratory animal care: 
• “Report of the AVMA Panel on Euthanasia” 
(19) and subsequent revisions. 
• NIH Guidelines for the Laboratory Use of 
Chemical Carcinogens (45). 
• Biological Safety Manual for Research Involv- 
ing Oncogenic Viruses (40). 
• Classification of Etiologic Agents on the Basis 
of Hazard (39) and subsequent revisions. 
• Laboratory animal management and stand- 
ards documents developed by committees of 
the Institute of Laboratory Animal Resources 
(3). 
The accreditation procedure involves 11 steps. 
First, an application is requested from AAALAC. 
The completed application for accreditation is 
returned to AAALAC, which reviews it and deter- 
mines whether the applicant is eligible to seek ac- 
creditation. After the application fee is paid, the 
Chairman of the AAALAC Council on Accredita- 
tion selects the site-visit team. Normally, this con- 
sists of one member of the council and one con- 
sultant. The institution is notified of the date and 
time of the visit and the names of the site visitors 
and is asked to have assembled materials ready. 
The site-visit team inspects the laboratory -animal 
care facility and evaluates all aspects of the ani- 
mal care program with respect to AAALAC stand- 
ards. Copies of the report are forwarded to two 
members of the council, who evaluate it for com- 
pleteness and clarity. The final site visit report is 
then reviewed by the council during its next sched- 
uled council meeting, and the accreditation sta- 
tus of the applicant is determined. The Board of 
Trustees confirms the action of the council. Finally, 
the applicant institution is provided with a letter 
summarizing the conclusions of the council (3). 
After the initial site visit, an institution can be 
awarded full accreditation, provisional accredita- 
tion, or accreditation can be withheld . For accred- 
ited institutions, AAALAC reinspects facilities once 
every 3 years and can either decide to continue 
accreditation, provide a probationary accredita- 
tion while deficiencies are corrected, or revoke 
accreditation. Sixty -six percent (483 out of 731) of 
the institutions applying for accreditation since 
1965 have received it. 
Although AAALAC is a private, voluntary orga- 
nization, its decisions carry great weight because 
the PHS recognizes AAALAC accreditation as a 
demonstration of institutional compliance with 
PHS policies. Moreover, the NIH Guide for the Care 
and Use of Laboratory Animals is the benchmark 
AAALAC uses in assessing the adequacy of lab- 
oratory facilities, sanitation, veterinary care, ani- 
mal husbandry, and such basic but important de- 
tails such as cage size. Approximately 25 percent 
of the close to 1,000 institutions with approved 
assurances on file with NIH are AAALAC -accredited. 
POLICIES OF SCIENTIFIC AND PROFESSIONAL SOCIETIES 
A number of scientific societies and professional 
organizations associated with science and research 
have generated policies on the standards of con- 
duct expected of their members in the care or use 
of animals. Some of these are simple statements 
of support for research use and for humane care 
of research animals in accordance with Federal 
and State laws and the NIH Guide. For example, 
the American Association for Laboratory Animal 
Science (AALAS), an organization that emphasizes 
improved animal care and personnel training (13), 
has issued a four-paragraph statement of this na- 
ture (1). It states, in part: “The AALAS is committed 
to the principles of humane care and treatment 
of laboratory animals and endorses membership 
compliance with established scientific and legal 
standards.” 
The AALAS policy statement also contains some 
of the strong language that has only recently be- 
gun to appear in statements of scientific and profes- 
sional organizations: 
Many of the factors that affect both animal and 
human life can only be studied in intact animal 
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