Im not big on the whole animal testing either..I can understand how its been useful in certain contexts..but personaly I just cant stand to think about it..I took a class in environmental philosophy in college and my professor pulled out some really sick videos of tests being done on animals in america..hurling monkeys in walls..crushing the skulls of live gorillas to measure the pressure bike helmets can withstand so that can put a little sticker of approval on it to satisfy all the soccer moms of america..some of these things we can definatily get along just fine without.

I swear some of the things I saw in that class left me devistated..I had no idea of how far some people had gone with animal testing..alot of it is 100% unethical and unnecessary, seems to cause rediculous suffereing to the animals, it's discusting..

Not all animal testing I dont think is like that..but alot of it we could do easily without.

"It is ethically much more tolerable to use people who have violated the social contract in such a way that they cannot claim to be entitled to any kind of protection society offers. I´m thinking of rapists or people who´ve violently molested other human beings.

If you oppose the use of those people as test objects, than i don´t see how you could justify the use of animals that have never done anything to deserve being treated this way, except being born into this world."

This is a very good point..when you weigh it out like that ethically that makes alot of sense..

I think animal testing is cruel and down right an unnecessary practice, animal testing is so prevalent today because its much easier and quicker for companies to get their harmful cancer causing products on the market so that masses of people can buy their products and the companies can make millions. Its been proven time and time again that animal testing is an unnecessary practice that is completely inhumane and barbaric...

I urge you to watch this video as images do not lie and if you can still say that you are pro animal testing then i don't think you are human...

Testing 123


Much Peace and Sunshine

Wow, this is exactly the poem folk from green peace always say. You do not happen to work for them, do you??

This statement is laughable because companies are forced to do animal tests (as well as human trials) before releasing a drug. This costs a lot of money and time. Unfortunately cell culture tests are totally inadequate at predicting the effects of a drug to a whole organism. Money-thirsty companies would basically release drugs without doing any tests at all if they could, you know that, right? And often in the past people were getting massively poisoned due to untested preparations sold by aspiring entrepreneurs without proper tests.

Also, "cancer causing products"? like for instance? do you have any reference of a drug that went through animal and human trials just to get out in the market and caused cancer?

Now, to the facts.

we know that vitamins are good because of past animal testing
we know about the effects, side effects and dosages because of animal testing
we know about the toxicity of compounds and environmental contaminants because on animal testing
we know why some foods are beneficial and why some others are bad because of animal testing.
We know how to save people from certain death because of animal testing. we know how to prevent so many diseases because of animal testing.

Just to name a few.

Animal testing is not only about testing cosmetics to animals and barbarising them (whatever that means)

Infundibulum


33 Reasons Why Animal Testing is Pointless By Phil Haylock


1. Less than 2% of human illnesses (1.16%) are ever seen in animals.

2. According to the former scientific executive of Huntingdon Life Sciences, animal tests and human results agree only '5%-25% of the time'.

3. 95% of drugs passed by animal tests are immediately discarded as useless or dangerous to humans.

4. At least 50 drugs on the market cause cancer in laboratory animals. They are allowed because it is admitted the animal tests are not relevant.

5. Procter & Gamble used an artificial musk despite it failing the animal tests, i.e., causing tumours in mice. They said the animal test results were 'of little relevance for humans'.

6. When asked if they agreed that animal experiments can be misleading 'because of anatomical and physiological differences between animals and humans', 88% of doctors agreed.

7. Rats are only 37% effective in identifying what causes cancer to humans. Flipping a coin would be more accurate.

8. Rodents are the animals almost always used in cancer research. They never get carcinomas, the human form of cancer, which affects membranes (e.g lung cancer). Their sarcomas affect bone and connecting tissue: the two cannot be compared.

9. Up to 90% of animal test results are discarded as they are inapplicable to man.

10. The results from animal experiments can be altered by factors such as diet and bedding. Bedding has been identified as giving cancer rates of over 90% and almost nil in the same strain of mice at different locations.

11. Sex differences among laboratory animals can cause contradictory results. This does not correspond with humans.

12. 9% of anaesthetised animals, intended to recover, die.

13. An estimated 83% of substances are metabolised by rats in a different way to humans.

14. Attempts to sue the manufacturers of the drug Surgam failed due to the testimony of medical experts that: 'data from animals could not be extrapolated safely to patients'.

15. Lemon juice is a deadly poison, but arsenic, hemlock and botulin are safe according to animal tests.

16. Genetically modified animals are not models for human illness. The mdx mouse is supposed to represent muscular dystrophy, but the muscles regenerate without treatment.

17. 88% of stillbirths are caused by drugs which are passed as being safe in animal tests, according to a study in Germany.

18. 61% of birth defects are caused by drugs passed safe in animal tests, according to the same study. Defect rates are 200 times post war levels.

19. One in six patients in hospital are there because of a treatment they have taken.

20. In America, 100,000 deaths a year are attributed to medical treatment. In one year 1.5 million people were hospitalised by medical treatment.

21. A World Health Organisation study showed children were 14 times more likely to develop measles if they had been vaccinated.

22. 40% of patients suffer side effects as a result of prescription treatment.

23. Over 200,000 medicines have been released, most of which are now withdrawn. According to the World Health Organisation, only 240 are 'essential'.

24. A German doctors' congress concluded that 6% of fatal illnesses and 25% of organic illness are caused by medicines. All have been animal tested.

25. The lifesaving operation for ectopic pregnancies was delayed 40 years due to vivisection.

26. According to the Royal Commission into vivisection (1912), 'The discovery of anaesthetics owes nothing to experiments on animals'. The great Dr Hadwen noted that 'had animal experiments been relied upon...humanity would have been robbed of this great blessing of anaesthesia'. The vivisector Halsey described the discovery of Fluroxene as 'one of the most dramatic examples of misleading evidence from animal data'.

27. Aspirin fails animal tests, as does digitalis (a heart drug), cancer treatments, insulin (causes animal birth defects), penicillin and other safe medicines. They would have been banned if vivisection were heeded.

28. In the court case when the manufacturers of Thalidomide were being tried, they were acquitted after numerous experts agreed that animal tests could not be relied on for human medicine.

29. Blood transfusions were delayed 200 years by animal studies, corneal transplants were delayed 90 years.

30. Despite many Nobel prizes being awarded to vivisectors, only 45% agree that animal experiments are crucial.

31. At least 450 methods exist with which we can replace animal experiments.

32. At least thirty-three animals die in laboratories each second worldwide; in the UK, one every four seconds.

33. The Director of Research Defence Society, (which exists to defend vivisection) was asked if medical progress could have been achieved without animal use. His written reply was 'I am sure it could be'.


I don't have anything more to say about the matter my friend...


Much Peace and Rainbows

aegle,

Your reason's list is skewed with most of the statements being borderline incorrect, one-sided, dogmatised, unreferenced or phrased so as to favour the writer's conclusion

This list is not rational intercourse, sorry I was expecting better from you and no poems. If you want to support these statements please provide me with evidence for these statements. Then we speak.

Also, you did not answer any of my points in my post but rather redirected me to the "list of facts". This is bad, bad, bad rhetorics.

The germans and japanese used people in concentrationcamps as test subjects.

Imagine that this practice would never have been abolished and that there where no animals to test on. Would you, if the benefits of continuing this practice would be huge, still say: testing on random jews, gipsy's, koreans and chinese citizens brings so much benefits and saves at least 10.000 times the lives it cost ( if this would be so), it is worth to continue doing this?

I know it's a tasteless example, but it's all about the question how far we are prepared to go in causing pain and suffering.

The excuse that we also use animals to eat doesn't count either. One unethical thing cannot make the other right.

They also used jews and koreans etc. for testing chemical weapons on, that doesn't make it less evil to use them for testing medications.

Did rats care when they were carrying around the black death that killed 1/3 europeans in the middle ages? Nope. Do I care when scientists cut off rats heads slice out their brains and throw em in a blender? Nope.

Seriously opposing animal testing is extremely naive. It would be IMPOSSIBLE (with current technology) to find the cure for cancer without testing the drugs on animals first. Now tell me you are opposed to animal testing? If you are your anti cure for cancer sorry. Thats reality hate to admit but its true. Cell culture won't cut it, in vitro won't cut it. Healthy volunteers is too risky until the animal tests are done. Its just the way it is right now until some really awesome technology can make better assay's available.

Also you should be aware that their are ethical commitees to determine when its necessary to do animal testing you can't just do whatever you want whenever you want. THere are also guidelines for humane treatment and sacrificing methods.

Well, we still test on humans. There is no drug that is tested only on animals and clinical trials on humans are also mandatory prior to a drug's release in the public.


why not? since when meat eating is unethical? I say that plant eating is equally unethical as well.

You know that there's a difference between the tests currently done on humans and what the german and japanese nazi's did.
The subjects where unvoluntary, for instance and it where the kind of tests that brought forth a great chance of not surviving them. Actually it was often a test of what a human was capable of surviving. Ectreme cold, nerve gas, etc.

The basis of all ethics is the ability of having sensations like sufferening.

I know that there are and have been philosophers like kant and aristotle who disagree on this. But i'm right.

The great philosopher jeremy betham explained why this doesn't even need any line of argumentation with the words "is it possible to move the earth? yes, but not without another earth to stand upon" meaning that there is nothing so unescapable in forming judgements as sensations of pleasure and pain, that without these sensations there would not be judgments of the moral kind at all and that it is unlikely that there will ever be found anything (or it must be god in heaven himself ofcourse) that is to even gain an equal status in this, as sensations of pleasure or pain.

It is these sensations and the inevitable judgements folling from them, from wich our mind, personality and everything we know is molded.

I think that it may even be the first knowledge a human being posesses in his life :"this is nice and that isn't nice, i like this and i don't like that".

This thread makes me want to vomit ninja stars.
There is nothing "OK" about "Harvesting" Whales.

Everyone - read this very short little comic - http://ljconstantine.com/babycakes/page1.htm - it changes the perspective a tad.

Revenge on an spp of animal for a disease they carried unknowingly - very nice.

Is there anything wrong with caring ?

To me its the same as testing on babies - hence my last link.

You're absolutely right, there's a great difference. In almost all the cultures slaves were used as guinea pigs for whatever experiments (is this root poisonous? can this axe split a skull with one hit? etc)

My stance on experimental animals is an unusual one; laboratory animals are bred for experiments just as farm animals are bred for meat. I see no real distinction between the two since both in effect serve humans in either being (food) or well-being (health).

I believe that the relationship we have with laboratory animals is a symbiotic one. We are "bound" to a contract by which we both benefit as species. The laboratory animals give us their bodies from which we get to know about things whereas we propagate them, offer protection from their predators and disease provide safe housing, food, water etc.

It is part of my job to maintain a mouse colony among my other duties for my experiments. I have to maintain a stock of mice out of which I breed animals that will be used for future experiments. It works more-or-less like this with all lab animals everywhere around the world.

It is impossible for me to avoid seeing the situation from an ecological perspective. If these animals were in the wild they'd compose a finite population of breeding individuals. Some of them would survive and some would die from predators, famine and disease. Their numbers would be limited to the extent their ecological niche allows them.

Well, rules do not change much in the lab colony; but here I provide safety from predators, I provide food, water and hygiene and I control their numbers to a more-or-less stable number. When there is need for experimental animals the colony breeds and the extra animals that now "overpopulate" the colony are used for experiments.

It is as simple as that.

You seriously going to tell me that a few thousand rats lives are more important then hundreds or thousands of people who could potentially be healed by drugs developed with animal testing?

Who wouldnt want alternatives to this...

HLS Exposed

Inside HLS

Pharmaceutical companies all over the world still test there drugs on humans they go to third world countries and hand their new drugs out to the communities in poor and third world countries. Then they do studies on the adverse affects that occur in each population before they release the drugs in first world countries...human testing still goes on in spite of animal testing...

I don't eat anything that i can make friends with i believe animals are not here for us to use and abuse rather we should respect and treasure all life no matter how small that life is...

Cancer and many other diseases are present due to our actions and ignorance why should animals have to suffer for the poor and short sighted choices that we make...


ALTERNATIVES TO ANIMAL TESTING

Besides saving countless animal lives, alternatives to animal tests are efficient and reliable. At the start of the 21st Century, non-animal techniques have become the cutting edge of medical research. Forward-thinking companies are exploring modern alternatives. For example, Pharmagene Laboratories, based in Royston, England, is the first company to use only human tissues and sophisticated computer technologies in the process of drug development and testing. With tools from molecular biology, biochemistry, and analytical pharmacology, Pharmagene conducts extensive studies of human genes and how drugs affect those genes or the proteins they make. While some companies have used animal tissues for this purpose, Pharmagene scientists believe that the discovery process is much more efficient with human tissues. “If you have information on human genes, what’s the point of going back to animals?” says Pharmagene cofounder Gordon Baxter.

• Cell Culture
• Computers
• Microorganisms
• Molecular methods
• Population research
• Volunteer studies
• Practical examples
• Cystic Fibrosis
• Brain research
• Asthma
• Multiple Sclerosis
• Skin cancer
• AIDS related pneumonia
• Brain tumours
• Virtual organs
• Tissue engineering of the liver

CELL CULTURE
It is possible to obtain human cells and tissues from biopsies, post-mortems, placentas, or as waste from surgery, and grow them in the laboratory.

Drug testing can use cell culture to great advantage, and many forward thinking scientists use cell culture in tests that traditionally have used animals – like screening drugs for a positive effect or the potential to do damage. In 1996 a team based at Uppsala, Sweden, compared animal test data, human experience and the results of cell culture tests for a range of chemicals. Their aim was to discover whether animals or cell culture were better predictors of what happens in humans. The cell culture results were found to be significantly more accurate. Since then further advances have been made, such as the use of lasers in cell culture tests, and 3D tissue structures, making cell cultures superior by a greater margin.

Skin tests on animals cannot be justified given the existence of the EpiDerm test which uses human skin cells and is accepted as accurate, and Epipack which uses sheets of cloned human skin cells. The Human Keratinocyte Bioassay enables a computer to measure damage to the epithelial cells, which cover the skin and eyes. Corrositex detects skin damage using a membrane and a chemical detection fluid, and gives results in 4 hours – compared with 4 weeks for animal tests. The MatTek EpiOcular test has been using human cells since 1985 to evaluate eye irritancy, and is one of many that do the job. Incredibly, animals are still used in these sorts of tests.

Ensuring safety for pregnant mothers is a popular use of animals. The Embryonic Cell Test (EST) is a highly accurate test which has been available since 2001, and a medical journal review recently claimed that it alone was more valuable than all animal tests combined in this area. The Micromass (MM) test is also invaluable, and is proven particularly effective for chemicals causing specific forms of damage to the growing embryo.

By comparison, animal tests are extremely inaccurate, and rarely more accurate that pure guesswork. Over 97% of substances predicted as dangerous to pregnant humans are entirely safe. Substances claimed to be dangerous in the animal lab include oxygen, several vitamins, and many safe fruit and vegetable extracts. For substances that are dangerous to humans, animals are rarely more effective than could be expected by chance. 70% of dangerous drugs are safe in pregnant monkeys.

The American National Cancer Institute (NCI) now favours cell culture over animals in drug screening and can “screen up to 20,000 compounds per year for potential anticancer activity” using “60 different human tumor cell lines, representing leukaemia, melanoma, and cancers of the lung, colon, brain, ovary, breast, prostate and kidney.”

The alternative is to use animals, which is not effective. A textbook explains: "despite 25 years of intensive research and positive results in animal models, not a single anti-tumour drug emerged from this work."

It is also important that human cells, rather than animal cells, are used for medical research, to avoid the problem of relating results from one species to another. To encourage the use of human tissue the Dr Hadwen Trust has helped establish the Human Tissue Bank at Leicester. The Dr Hadwen Trust has funded research using human cells and tissues to replace animal experiments, into Alzheimer's disease, cancer, rheumatism, cataracts, allergies, meningitis, and more.


COMPUTERS
An area where animal use is particularly popular yet also especially flawed in predicting effective drugs and identifying dangerous ones – yet HLS are still using this outdated, inaccurate method. Computers have revolutionised this area, as their ability to handle millions of interactions simultaneously enables them to model physical conditions.

Among various models of the human heart is the one developed by Denis Noble at Oxford University. It beats, develops illnesses and reacts to drugs. Drug companies have been using it since 2001 to predict drug reactions and eliminate dangerous drugs. It can replay reactions, show them in slow motion, and be subjected to extremes that animals and patients can’t.

Other computer packages predict drug effects – one specialises in those in babies and children, an area animal tests have shown their failure with dramatic results for the children involved. The goal of developing an entire virtual human is being achieved already, with organs and their interactions being simulated accurately along with reactions to drugs.

The sort of technology scientists are watching with great interest is microdosing. Patients are given 1% of a test drug while their body is scanned using Accelerator Mass Spectrometry. This shows where the drug is and monitors it’s activity and effects. Evaluation of microdosing has shown it to be surprisingly accurate, even on drugs than have unusual, unexpected characteristics.

It’s even been proven to work at lower test levels. Tests using one millionth (0.0001%) of therapeutic doses still enabled evaluation of drug concentrations in blood, saliva, urine, DNA and white blood cells. An expert explained "we can say with confidence that between 30 min and 45 minutes after dosing, 0.09% of the oral dose resided within the white blood cells in the blood. We were also able to show uptake of AZT into the genetic material of these cells, which is ultimately how antivirals like AZT inhibit viral replication. Such data could not have been obtained by any other method". By comparison, animals are known to metabolise medicines along different routes in the body. The majority of dangerous reactions are missed in animal tests, and most dangerous reactions predicted at that stage never happen in humans.

Part of the problem with animals studies is that straight away there’s a complex animal with millions of interactions that are too complex to unravel. Now it’s increasingly obvious that we need to understand what’s happening with individual cells, and even within individual cells. Proteomics is the study of how proteins are arranged in individual cells, and already this area has enabled advances: for example working out how to enable cancer dugs to interact with target cells.

Now projects have started to catalogue protein activity in cells to understand what happens to cause illnesses. An expert explains: “Proteins are central to our understanding of cellular function and disease processes and without a concerted effort in proteomics the fruits of genomics will go unrealised. The necessity of proteomics cannot be avoided”

No animal liver is similar to a human liver, which is a major problem because this organ is central to the way a drug is handled in the body. But now human liver has been grown in the lab, and can be used to test drugs. A report said that the discovery “eliminates the need for animal experiments for drug testing.”

With this wealth of scientific methodology available, there clearly isn’t a need for animal testing. Ironically, HLS’ vehement defence of their animal testing practices could prove their undoing. As the industry moves on, the new methods are those that will enable commercial survival. The Chairman of Charles River, largest lab animal supplier in the world, was asked about the company’s diversification which has reduced the animal trade from 80% to 40% of business activity in just five years. “I don’t want to sit here and say ‘Hey, there goes our animal business’ ” he explained, while explaining a new non animal test that was far superior to the old animal methods. HLS’ obstinacy and refusal to embrace the new methods ignores the revolution which is leaving animal tests as scientifically undesirable and enabling scientists to gain a previously impossible understanding of medical science. This technology could also play a part in hastening the demise of HLS.



MICROORGANISMS
Tests with simple microorganisms, such as bacteria and yeasts, are being used as early indicators of chemicals likely to be harmful, and are frequently faster, cheaper and more humane than animal tests. Bacteria can be genetically manipulated to manufacture useful products previously obtained from animals, such as human insulin and monoclonal antibodies.

The Trust's research into diabetes successfully used a microscopic organism called Hydra, as an alternative to diabetic animals. Whilst another Trust researcher has developed a test-tube method of growing the microbes responsible for causing sleeping sickness, a fatal tropical illness, replacing the mice normally used for research into this disease.



MOLECULAR METHODS
Technological advances are resulting in new and improved molecular methods for analysing and identifying new compounds and medicines. The Trust has provided analytical equipment to researchers selecting new anti-cancer and anti-malaria drugs, based on their molecular interaction with DNA, as an alternative to selecting drugs by animal tests.

Research at the molecular level is being used to understand the biochemistry and genetics underlying various illnesses, and leading to better treatments. A Trust researcher is using newly devised technology to rapidly analyse DNA from patients all over Europe and identify genes that predispose individuals to fibrosing lung disease. This approach is an alternative to modelling the illness in animals such as genetically modified mice.


POPULATION RESEARCH
Studying the diseases in human populations, and the effects of lifestyle, diet and occupation, has already revealed a great deal about cancer, heart disease, osteoporosis , and birth defects. Such information is vital to improving human health and providing clues to the causes of illnesses. The Trust is funding part of a large population study into how fetal and infant growth influences the development of heart disease in later life, as an alternative to experiments on pregnant animals.



VOLUNTEER STUDIES
One of the best ways to conduct medical research is by studying the whole human being. New scanning and imaging techniques are making it increasingly possible to conduct safe and ethical studies of human volunteers, where previously animals had been used.

Trust projects use a variety of sophisticated imaging techniques to non-invasively investigate the intact human body. These include using a MEG scanner to study epileptic patients; investigating pain in patients with fMRI; and developing a novel technique, TMS, to study the function of the human brain in healthy volunteers.


PRACTICAL EXAMPLES
The Dr Hadwen Trust is the UK's leading medical research charity funding exclusively non-animal techniques to replace animal experiments, benefiting humans and animals. By looking at some of their current research projects we can see how alternatives can be developed and practically applied in real life research scenarios to the benefit of humans and animals. Click here for a full list of projects.

CYSTIC FIBROSIS

The Problem
Most cystic fibrosis (CF) patient illness and death is due to persistent lung infections caused by bacteria, the most important of which is Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Once infection has been established these bacteria are never eradicated. During “exacerbations” patients are particularly ill and require hospitalisation and intravenous antibiotic therapy. At present doctors have very poor information upon which to base their choice of antibiotics, since isolates of bacteria from CF sputum samples show an astonishing variation in their antibiotic susceptibilities and in many other characteristics.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
Current modeling bacterial populations and testing of antibiotics is conducted on rats with chronic respiratory infections and mouse models of CF, usually genetically engineered knock out mice who are infected with P.aeruginosa. Each experiment uses hundreds of animals and results may not be directly applicable to human patients.

The Alternative
This study will monitor changes in bacterial populations in CF patient sputum to improve our understanding of what happens during exacerbations and periods of stability. The project will also test the usefulness of an artificial sputum medium (ASM) as an alternative to animals for studying the behaviour of bacterial populations in response to challenge with antibiotics. These methods could help doctors to make better informed choices of antibiotic treatments and directly benefit CF patients.



BRAIN RESEARCH

The Problem
Non-invasive brain imaging methods can now be used to study the human brain and identify which areas of the brain ‘light up’ or become active during mental tasks. However important questions still remain as to how different areas of the brain interact and what each area contributes when carrying out tasks. To date, these kinds of questions have been answered using monkeys. The Dr Hadwen Trust funded early work that showed how a new research tool called transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) could be used to temporarily disrupt areas of the brain in volunteers. This project will develop TMS to the next stage by applying it to investigate how different areas of the brain interact.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
Brain research experiments on monkeys often involve subjecting animals to long periods of training and testing. They undergo surgery to expose an area of the brain and a device is fixed to the skull for applying recording and stimulating electrodes. They may also have regions of the brain damaged and the monkeys are usually killed at the end of the experiments.

The Alternative
Instead of studying monkeys, this project will use dual-site TMS to shed light on the interaction of two areas of the human brain known to be involved in visual attention. The research will increase our understanding of how the human brain works and provide an alternative to animal experiments. It will also have also implications for the treatment of psychiatric conditions involving attention deficit, such as schizophrenia, and the consequences of brain damage.


ASTHMA (1)

The Problem
Asthma is a serious worldwide problem affecting over 300 million people and its prevalence among children is increasing. Abnormal mucus production is a major feature of asthma, and other respiratory conditions such as cystic fibrosis and COPD (chronic pulmonary obstructive disease). Mucus is not easily cleared from the lungs and can block the airways leading to suffocation. Understanding how airway cells control the production of mucus and finding ways to switch off over-production of mucus could be crucial to finding new treatments.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
Many laboratories use animals in asthma research usually injecting them with allergens to induce inflammation of the lungs and produce asthma-like symptoms, although no animal study exactly replicates human asthma. Mice are usually used, but other species have included rats, guinea pigs, dogs and cats. In particular, there are differences in the number and distribution of mucus-secreting cells between species, as well as other significant anatomical and immunological differences.

The Alternative
The research project will use cells collected from asthmatic patients to create a three-dimensional cell culture model of mucus production. This new model will represent the human condition and will be used to investigate how mucus production is controlled and to find ways to switch off over-production of mucus. Importantly, this cell culture model will provide an alternative to animal studies in this area, and could also be
adapted to study other serious respiratory conditions.

ASTHMA (2)

The Problem
Asthma rates are soaring worldwide, especially in children, although the reasons for this remain unclear. Asthma affects an estimated eight million people in the UK, that’s one in 13 adults and one in eight children. Animals are widely used in asthma research, but important species differences between the lungs of humans, rats, mice and other animals, mean that there are marked variations between findings in animal experiments and humans with asthma.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
Rats, mice, rabbits, guinea pigs and increasingly genetically engineered mice are used in asthma research. Animals are subjected to repeated and distressing treatments, including multiple injections in the abdomen. Asthma-like symptoms are induced by sensitising the animals’ lungs, producing inflamed airways and difficultly in breathing.

The Alternative
Our asthma project at King’s College London is investigating changes that occur in the airways of asthmatics, instead of studying animals with induced asthma-like symptoms. The latest imaging and genetic techniques are being applied to biopsy samples of airway smooth muscle cells taken from volunteers with and without asthma. This project will establish the use of these human cells in culture as a research tool to replace animal experiments.


MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS

The Problem
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a devastating disease that affects around 2.5 million people and for which there is no cure. It causes a range of symptoms, including muscle weakness, loss of co-ordination, problems with speech and vision, severe fatigue, pain and depression.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
For decades much research into MS has involved inducing an experimental condition called autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) in rodents, monkeys, rabbits and guinea-pigs as a ‘model’ of human MS. Animals suffer inflammation and damage to the nervous system resulting in paralysis, in experiments that can cause distress and suffering. More recently EAE has been studied in genetically modified mice, either ‘humanized’ by the addition of human genes or with genes ‘knocked out’.

Despite more than 10,000 published experiments on animals with EAE, the human disease MS remains poorly understood, treatments are very limited, and a cure remains elusive. More advanced non-animal approaches to studying MS are urgently needed.

The Alternative
The Dr Hadwen Trust is funding a one-year pilot study to investigate the potential of applying a new molecular technique to MS research to replace animal studies.

Hallmark damage to the nervous system seen in MS is believed to be caused by the patient’s own immune system attacking and damaging the nerves. Patients’ immune cells can be obtained from blood samples and studied in culture.

In our project, a new molecular technique called RNA knockdown will be applied to immune cells from MS patients. Particular genes in the immune cells will be turned-off to see which ones are contributing to the immune responses that underlie MS. This approach will replace experiments on knockout mice with induced EAE, which are currently used to investigate contribution of immune system genes to MS.



3D MODELS OF SKIN CANCER

The Problem
Basal cell carcinoma (BCC), a type of skin cancer associated with sun exposure and ageing, is the commonest human cancer. Diagnosis and treatment places a large burden on our health services. BCC is usually easy to treat if caught early, but it can become dangerous if left untreated. Treatment may involve complicated surgery that can leave unsightly scarring.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
At present there are no cell culture models of this type of cancer and so research is often carried out on mice genetically modified to develop tumours. In one recent experiment, genetically modified (knockout) mice were subjected to irradiation to induce large aggressive tumours on their undersides. Sometimes human cells may be implanted into mice with deficient immune systems to model the disease. A single experiment may use as many as 400 mice.

The Alternative
The Dr Hadwen Trust is funding researchers at Queen Mary’s School of Medicine and Dentistry who are creating the first cell culture model of BCC to replace the use of mice in research. They are attempting to incorporate human BCC cells into complex three-dimensional cell culture models of human skin. Their aim is to create realistic laboratory models of this common form of human skin cancer that can replace widespread experiments on mice. The research will also help us to understand the development of BCC and why some forms are more aggressive than others, and could shed light on other types of skin cancer too.



AIDS-RELATED PNEUMONIA

The Problem
Pneumocystis jirovecii is an infectious fungus that grows in the lungs of immunocompromised patients and causes pneumonia, particularly in AIDS patients. At present it is not possible to culture this pathogen in the test-tube, and so much research has instead focused on rats and mice infected with a related, but different fungus.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
A fungus that causes a form of pneumonia in rodents is grown in the lungs of animals whose immune systems have been damaged, either with chemicals or by genetic mutation. Rats and mice are used as living incubators in which to grow the fungus, which is inoculated into their lungs. Animals are likely to suffer breathing difficulties as the disease progresses. Once they develop pneumonia they become seriously ill and are killed.

The Alternative
A Dr Hadwen Trust project at University College London is devising the first-ever test-tube method for culturing the human pathogen, to replace experiments on infected rodents with purposely damaged immune systems. The project is investigating both short- and long-term culture methods, using donated samples of human lungs cells from infected patients. The fruits of this project could revolutionise research in this field, which for so long has focused on the wrong species.



BRAIN TUMOUR INVASION

The Problem
Brain tumours are one of the most difficult forms of cancer to treat and they are becoming more common. Tumours in the brain are particularly resistant to drug treatment and radiotherapy, and new approaches to treatment are urgently needed.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
Much research into brain tumour therapies involves experiments on rats and mice. Animals either have brain tumours chemically induced, or pieces of human brain tumour are surgically implanted in their brains. Each experiment typically uses around 100 rodents, who are all killed for autopsy. In America, researchers have studied experimental brain tumours in dogs. Many differences between human and animal brain tumours make animal experiments ‘grossly inadequate’. Artificially induced animal brain tumours can be ‘cured’ but the human disease has a very poor outlook.

The Alternative
Dr Hadwen Trust-funded researchers at Portsmouth University are creating a three-dimensional culture model of human brain tumour invasion. Human brain cells are ethically obtained from patients undergoing surgery. Normal brain cells are grown in the lab alongside balls of tumour cells (spheroids) to produce a model of brain tumour invasion. The very latest microscope and live-cell imaging techniques are being used to study the model and to investigate potential anti-tumour therapies, instead of experiments in rats or mice.



COMPUTER MODELLING OF VIRTUAL ORGANS

The Problem
Animal tests are notoriously bad at predicting the safety and effectiveness of new drugs. According to a recent report by the American drug regulatory body, 92% of drugs that pass animal tests subsequently fail in human trials. Clearly, more accurate non-animal tests are needed. Computer modelling holds enormous potential to replace animal experiments in medical research and testing.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
More than half a million animals are used in UK pharmaceutical research and testing. These include monkeys, dogs, cats, sheep, pigs, rabbits, ferrets, guinea pigs, mice, rats, birds, and more.

The Alternative
Dr Hadwen Trust funding is supporting the construction of computer models of the human heart, uterus and spinal cord at Leeds University, using data acquired with the very latest imaging technology, diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). The computer models will be used to conduct virtual experiments on human organs and will have a wide range of applications. For example, to screen new heart drugs (anti-arrhythmics) in place of experiments on dogs, rodents, rabbits, pigs, goats, guinea-pigs and cats. To study spinal cord pathways and new nerve injury therapies, instead of spinal cord injury experiments on rats and mice. And for research into labour and premature labour, replacing experiments on pregnant sheep and guinea-pigs.

Prof Holden’s laboratory is a member of BioSim, a European Network of Excellence, which brings together research groups working in this area. This will help to ensure that new computer simulations are readily distributed and adopted by other researchers.


TISSUE ENGINEERING OF HUMAN LIVER

The Problem
The liver is a large organ that plays a vital role in the body’s metabolism, and it continues to be the focus of much animal experimentation. In the development of new medicines, effects on the liver are always an important consideration, and routine tests are conducted in rats, monkeys and dogs. However, species differences mean that results from animal tests cannot reliably predict how humans will respond.

Animal Experiments to be Replaced
Serious liver infections, such as hepatitis viruses, are investigated in infected ground squirrels, woodchucks, monkeys, and genetically modified mice. Chimpanzees experimentally infected with hepatitis C virus continue to be studied in Japan and the USA. Again, species differences make the findings from such animal experiments of dubious relevance to human patients with liver diseases.

The Alternative
This project is using the very latest tissue engineering techniques to culture human liver cells on 3D micro-scaffolds, to create realistic cell culture models for the study of liver diseases, such as hepatitis, and for drug research and testing. Developing advanced human liver tissue cultures will help to replace the routine use of animals in these areas of research.

The aim is to establish the next generation of long-lived, exclusively human liver cultures that will maintain liver functions in the test-tube. Realistic and functional test-tube models of human liver would be invaluable for replacing animal research into liver diseases and for screening and testing new medicines. These improved in vitro models of human liver could have important implications for both human health and animal replacement.

References:

[1] “Pioneers Cut Out Animal Experiments,” New Scientist, 31 Aug. 1996.
[2] Clemedson C, McFarlane-Abdulla E, Andersson M, et al. MEIC Evaluation of Acute Systemic Toxicity. ATLA 1996;24:273-311
[3] www.mbresearch.com 31/12/2006
[4] www.mbresearch.com 31/12/2006
[5] Biogenic Amines Vol. 19, No. 2, pp. 97–145 (2005)
[6] Biogenic Amines Vol. 19, No. 2, pp. 97–145 (2005)
[7] Lewis, R. J., Sr. (1989). Sax’s Dangerous Properties of Industrial Materials. 7th edn. John Wiley, New York. Wilson, J. G. (1977). Current status of teratology. General principles and mechanisms derived from animal studies, in: Handbook of Teratology, pp. 1–47. Plenum Press, New York
[8] Biogenic Amines Vol. 19, No. 2, pp. 97–145 (2005)
[9] Developmental Toxicology: Mechanisms and Risk JA McLachlan, RM Pratt, C L Markert (Eds) 1987 p313
[10] http://dtp.nco.nih.gov/branches/btb/ivclsp.html
[11] JCW Salen, Animal Models-Principles and Problems in Handbook of Laboratory Animal Science 1994
[12] Christine Soares ‘Virtually Human’ New Scientist 16 June 2001
[13] ‘New Technology Detects Risk of Drugs to Heart Sooner’ Yorkshire Today 16th January 2006
[14] Business Guardian, Tuesday March 7th 2006
[15] http://www.drugresearche...dme-pk-pharmacokinetics
[16] http://www.emediawire.co...s/2005/10/emw300761.htm
Vitalea Science Pioneers "Accelerator Technology" for HIV-Drug Testing: Results from First Microdose Study of the Antiretroviral AZT Released
[17] Parke/Smith (eds) Drug Metabolism from Microbe to man, quoted Page "Viv. Unv." p45
[18] Clin Pharmacol Ther 1962; pp665-672
[19] AP Fletcher in Proc R Soc med, 1978;71, 693-8
[20] John Hopkins Medical institutions Press Release Aug 6th 2002 “Structure of key receptor unlocked; Related proteins will fall like dominoes”
[21] www.xensei.com/users/chi...hpr/hpr_pressrelease.htm
[22] This is London. 31 October 2006.
Animal Aid press release: Another nail in the coffin of animal research, Tuesday, October 31, 2006.
[23] Boston Globe, 27th Feb 2002


Much Peace and Compassion Always

I'm a big fan of science and progres. But we have to draw a line somewhere. If we're so afraid of dying that in our attempts to escape death we ruin ourselves and we become spineless cowards and worse, we lose all that would make our lives even worth living, wich is that we are beings with an innate capacity of caring, than i would say that the author of 'frankenstein' could not even have imagined the monstrosity we have created when we look in the mirror and don't feel a thing anymore.

But i'm sleepy so that's why i'm babling a bit i guess.

Aegle, your last post was a nice read. However it is single sided. Believe me, tests on animals are quite laborious, more difficult to do and more prone to fail. If one goes to do experiments on animals he does so because he understands the limitations of cell cultures and or computer simulations and also understands why he does it. You gave a list:


..and these are all valid points. But if these methods did not had limitations then scientists would not go for animal testing! My lab pays £200,000 a year to carry research on animals simply because there are no alternative in vitro or simulation approaches. These money are a total fortune so are we idiots, disillusioned or just plain sadists to carry on such an expensive research??? please tell me. On top of these, these money are coming from public funds. When we write grant proposals to ask for money, the examination panels of the funding bodies are very strict and will not fund a research on animals when there is an alternative. Why? I just said, because research on animals is so darn expensive.

Now think about diseases more complex than tumours/cancers. Tumours can be studied 90, maybe 95% accurately in non-animal experiments. They may be difficult to treat but fairly easy to study. Same goes for diseases like cyctic fibrosis, emphysema, alzheimers (all genetic diseases). Now, how about malaria? A parasite that infests a person via a mosquito vector, then resides in the hepatocytes in the liver, just to leave them at some point to infect red blood cells, multiply, burst them and destroy them, just for the progeny to get sucked by the next feeding mosquito on the poor infected individual, then the malaria parasites have sex inside the the mosquito's gut just to come out of its sting and infect another person.

All these are ultimately complicated processes and rely on the parasite attacking multiple systems. It is impossible to study solely by cell culture. I dare you lady find me a cell culture system that allows the study of all the virulence cycle of malaria. Same goes for other diseases like leishmaniasis, trypanosomiasis and various helminth-related infections.

Other physiological processes cannot be studied solely in vitro, these include embryonic development (seriously complex technique), behaviour (to study behaviour you SERIOUSLY need animals esp if the questions you ask are about those animals). an example; how do you study maternal behaviour, e.g. which hormones and which genes control the maternal instinct of, say nesting, caring for the offspring, becoming overly concerned or aggressive towards potential enemies? Cell cultures, modelling and molecular biology will only take you that far. I again dare you to show me how to do the latter studies without involving animals.

Finally, and more relevant to my subject, female reproductive physiology; women are too damn complex to study in tissue culture. Sure some work can be done in vitro. But all the complex hormonal milieu of GNRH, LH, FSH estrogens progesterones, receptors etc, the communication between 6 different organs; hypothalamus, pituitary, ovaries, oviduct, uterus, cervix to mediate ovulation, fertilisation, embryo transfer, implantation and gestation is insanely complex to even grasp using the "alternative" methods. Animal experiments have been absolutely essential for understanding all these processes (that are apparently remarkably similar to humans)

Do you understand what I am trying to say? Your post looked only at the cases where animal study is dispensable. The person who wrote it looked at all the areas at which in vitro non-animal studies are strong and powerful tools. This is why it is one-sided and the author of this text extrapolates his points to cover the entire science! Wrong! I here give you the other side, the types of experimental questions that will always be incomplete without going for the real shit, that is studying things in living organisms.

Right?

Infundibulum

Here's a few really good links check them out, i will never be for animal testing as i think we don't have the right ethically to harm and cause animals so much endless suffering they are sensitive beings that know no end to pain they have no ability to hope only to live in endless moments of suffering and trauma. There is no good enough reason to harm animals in such a way, I do understand that you feel like you are coming from a good place but i feel animal testing is a bad science that is ethically and morally wrong and its to high a price to pay for so called incorrect medical research...

Dr Hadwen Trust

Consumer Justice

Defective Drugs

Drug Recall

NY Times

Bayer Exposed


"I dont think animal testing keeps people so called safe..."


Much Peace and Sunshine

Well that's it.

You argue with feelings, I argue with reason. You feel pity for the animals suffering and I try the best possible ways to answer accurately scientific questions about physiology (the latter intrinsicly implies using animals in research)

So no basically there's no point arguing this issue with you.

Infundibulum

I just think and feel quite differently to the way that you do that's all i don't think that i am only thinking with emotion i have put forward valid concepts and ideas not only emotion. Just because i can have empathy and compassion does not mean i have predominantly an emotion based point of view...


Much Peace and Sunshine

There could be, still. You could argue about whether it's better to argue with feelings or with reason.

I would say that feelings ought to be given prominence since nobody ever argues solely with reason anyway.
This is because reason alone is no opinion yet.

So since reason is more or less enslaved by feelings, it is best to look for what it the meaning of these feelings is.