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MISCELLANEOUS
- common misconceptions about animal testing
| ANIMAL
RESEARCH: DANGER TO HUMAN HEALTH -
FACT OR FICTION?
(You can't fool all the people all the time) |
| Fiction: |
Medicines
need to be tested on animals. |
Fact: |
UNTRUE!
Animal tests are misleading because of the differences between
species, eg. morphine sedates people but stimulates cats; aspirin
causes birth defects in monkeys, mice and dogs, but not in people.
Even minimal dissimilarities can spell disaster. Animal tests
are performed to free the regulatory authorities from legal
accountability in the event of death or disability. |
| Fiction: |
Medicines
are safe, thanks to animal testing. |
Fact: |
UNTRUE!
Despite massive animal testing and research, adverse drug reactions
are the fourth leading cause of death in the United States and
Europe. |
| Fiction: |
Using
animals is the accurate way to test medicines. |
Fact: |
UNTRUE!
Animals and people react differently to medicines - human cell,
in vitro, tissue and organ cultures, clinical investigations
and observations of patients, epidemiology and computer and
mathematical models are the appropriate, accurate and scientific
methods for valid medical research. |
Animal tests are scientific... or are they? Judge for yourself...
- The common aspirin causes birth defects in rats, mice,
guinea pigs, cats, dogs, and even monkeys ... but not in man!
- The injectable contraceptive Depo-provera causes uterine
cancer in baboons and mammary cancer in dogs. Based on these "compelling"
animal tests, the American FDA (Food and Drug Administration)
banned the drug in humans.
However, 20 years' human experience in countries, which ignored
the animal tests, subsequently convinced the FDA that the drug
was safe for humans.
- The artificial sweetener, saccharine, causes bladder
cancer in rats, yet it is freely sold in supermarkets.
- Cyclosporin, the wonder drug given to human transplant
patients to help prevent organ rejection, is highly toxic to the
human kidney, the liver and the nervous system. This problem has
not been observed in the dog or the cat.
- The drug Tamoxifen, given to women to prevent breast
cancer, actually causes liver cancer in rats.
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