• Question: can we use other ways of testing products becides animals testing??????

    Asked by phobot to David, Helen, Ian, rhysphillips, Sarah on 19 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Ian van der Linde

      Ian van der Linde answered on 14 Jun 2011:

      There are already lots of other ways of testing products. These include using cultures of human cells, and testing on humans directly (for example, testing new drug formulations on people who are already terminally ill). Testing on animals is not very popular, and if there are alternatives available then most companies would use them because they would not want to be portrayed badly in the media.

    • Photo: Rhys Phillips

      Rhys Phillips answered on 14 Jun 2011:

      There are other ways and in many cases, they can actually provide better results. However these methods are difficult to develop in the first place. Coincidentally I discussed this last night with Dr. Kelly BeruBe from Cardiff University – go here if you want to find out more: http://www.rhysphillips.co.uk/pythagoras-trousers/episode-41/

    • Photo: Helen Fletcher

      Helen Fletcher answered on 19 Jun 2011:

      It has been illegal to use animal testing for cosmetics in the UK since 1998. We do use animals to develop vaccines. We use mice to test vaccines are safe and to screen potential vaccines for testing in humans. Mice are actually not very good models for selecting vaccines for TB, HIV and malaria (otherwise we would already have vaccines for these diseases). It is though a requirement of the UK MHRA and also ethics committees that we test vaccines in animals before giving them to humans. The immune response is highly complex and we just don’t know enough about all the complex cellular interactions to be able to do the testing in tissue culture rather than a mouse. There have been awful problems is the past with people giving a treatment to humans without extensively testing its safety in animals http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4811626.stm. We have a duty to be very careful and animal testing is part of that process. There are scientists who are trying to figure out all the complex cellular interactions so that they can create cell culture systems as alternatives to working with mice. It will be many years though before we will be able to use these alternatives. All animal work is done under the strictest conditions, see here for more info. http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/science-research/animal-research/
      We have to use the smallest number of animals possible and prove there is no alternative to using a mouse. We also have to minimise suffering to the animal and give pain relief/anaesthesia before giving the vaccines. All people who work with animals have to be trained and issued with a Home Office licence. Everything is done under the supervision of a vet and everything has to be recorded and reported back to the Home Office. It’s not perfect. In a perfect world we wouldn’t have to use animals. If you do have to use animals the best place to do it in the world is in the UK because we have the highest standards of animal welfare and strictest legal requirements of anywhere. There are lots of animal rights groups in teh UK who campaign against animal testing. This is a really good thing as the close scrutiny keeps standards in the UK very high. This is a difficult subject to talk about on a live chat or a message board but I hope you have found my answer helpful.

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