Are you for or against testing on animals? More4's 'Kill or Cure' week starts Mon 12 Dec, with the hard-hitting docu-drama 'Animals' at 9pm-11pm. The programme will be followed by a live webchat with animal rights activist, John Curtin (who appears in Animals) and Dr Simon Festing, head of the Research Defense Society. So 11pm Mon 12 Dec - your chance to put your questions to John and Simon.
The Kill or Cure website (http://www.channel4.com/killorcure) provides more details about the programmes, plus an interactive timeline charting the animal rights movement and medical discoveries over the last century. You'll also be able to watch clips of the programmes.
As the question of whether animal testing is scientifically valid for humans is absolutely crucial it is very disappointing that there is no scientist against animal testing to whom we can put questions during the live webchat on 11pm on Monday 12th Dec...
how about it More4...could you arrange for one of the many medical professionals/scientists against animal testing (on purely scientific grounds) to join Dr Festing on the webchat to answer questions?
I didn't think there were any medical professionals or scientists against animal research and tesing - you can't be against it on scientific grounds. If there are any such mavericks, it would be quite wrong to invite one on an equal basis, as it would suggest a 50/50 split within the scientific/medical community on this issue. They can join in the chat with the rest of us if they so wish.
Well Leo the Lion, your message is very telling. There seems to be a common misconception that animal rights activists/anti-vivisectionist are ill-informed idiots, and that 'clever' educated people could never be like-minded supporters. There has been a lot of propaganda in the media during the last few years which sadly people like you don't question, hence the general public have become very turned off - even frightened - of looking into the facts behind the protests. There are thousands of scientists and medical professionals, myself included who truly believe that vivisection has held up medical advancement, and caused horrific suffering and deaths to thousands of people. They are keen to stand up and debate the issue, but are not even allowed to it seems. Its not just about the pointless suffering of millions of animals, although many people think thats all we care about. Just because the more4 trailers say 'without animal labs we wouldn't have modern medicines' doesn't mean its true you know!
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Originally posted by leo the lion: I didn't think there were any medical professionals or scientists against animal research and tesing - you can't be against it on scientific grounds. If there are any such mavericks, it would be quite wrong to invite one on an equal basis, as it would suggest a 50/50 split within the scientific/medical community on this issue. They can join in the chat with the rest of us if they so wish.
I didn't think there were any medical professionals or scientists against animal research and tesing - you can't be against it on scientific grounds.
I don't understand why you say re can't be against it on scientific grounds - unfortunately although the scientific validity, or not, of animal testing is crucial the media always presents the issue as between '(implied All) scientists' and 'animal rights extremists' - there are though many scientists and medical professionals against on scientific grounds, I can briefly outline those grounds if you would like to consider them.
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If there are any such mavericks, it would be quite wrong to invite one on an equal basis, as it would suggest a 50/50 split within the scientific/medical community on this issue. They can join in the chat with the rest of us if they so wish.
I don't think it would suggest that at all - and if it did then, equally, having only a pro-vivisection scientist suggests a 100% agreement within the scientific/medical community on the issue but that is simply not the case - they would be there on the equal basis of both being scientists.
Well said CatrinaC If anyone wants to read a scientific paper written by some doctors summing up a few antivivisection arguments (assuming channel4 et al won't present a balanced program or invite an articulate scientist to put this point of view)you can find it at http://www.vivisection-absurd.org/indexf.html (part 2: a critical look at animal experimentation). Its long but very interesting!
Your link is broken, floozie66, like your argument. I think that paper was probably the deeply flawed one written by those few mavericks I was talking about. If their arguments are so powerful and their number so great, why has every major independent enquiry conducted in the last few years concluded that animal research is scientifically and medically useful?
Sorry leo, missed out the '.uk' bit (hell no one is perfect). But coming back to your point about major independant enquiries, who do you think funds them?? Given that most independant research is done by universities, who get the majority of their funding from research grants, and that their easiest sources of money are grants from medical research charities ie. the hugely successful (in a monetary funds sense) cancer research uk et al(who are also incidently one of the biggest players in the pro-vivisection campaign arena) do you think that they are really that 'independant'? Maybe you should start thinking for yourself for a change? 'Maverick' doesn't necessarily mean wrong... If it was your child that was ill, I hope they aren't the one getting the new drug. As Dr Festing said, you can't blame animal tests for not picking up adverse reactions. Its the purpose of human clinical trials to find out if the drugs are safe and if they work! Yes he really said that.. you were there on the web-chat and read it! Think about it. So what exactly IS the point of vivisection again??
I'd like to see a truly "independent" Inquiry. Unfortunately I have learnt that when one looks into the panel make-up of Inquiries there are less than independent viewpoints. Pipers pay for tunes. Those who are paid to produce reports, sit on comittees or are hired to front something, for example, the RDS, have to sing from the songsheet given. In other words, no-one is part of a quango or is a mouthpiece unless someone pays - unless is is entirely voluntary. that applies across the board, not just re animal testing.
Leo, Leo, Leo - if you are truly a lion ie King of the Jungle why are you so narrow-minded? Have you ever been to a public library - (assuming you can read, as you have scientifically proven you can type) -there you will find a wealth of books written by many scientists who have renounced the vivisectors argument. None seen are fluffy-bunny indeed many are former vivisectors. Is Dr Fester one of the Adams Family and how much does he earn? Does he hold shares in any testing companies or cage makers, restraining devices, transporters, feeders? Why are fewer than 5% of new drugs put forward to human trials and how many go on the market to then be withdrawn? Why are the breeders not brought to book when flouting laws due to advance warning of inspections and are there more than 21 inspectors for the whole of the UK testing fraternity? Where do the withdrawn drugs go? Is it the Third World?
Originally posted by leo the lion: Your link is broken, floozie66, like your argument. I think that paper was probably the deeply flawed one written by those few mavericks I was talking about.
Here is the link to that website, it contains a wealth of information from a variety of sources many of which are scientific/medical journals, and also many quotes from scientists/medical professionals, see the source refs given on the site. http://vivisection-absurd.org.uk/indexf.html
Here is an example quote from the site -
"No animal experiment with a medicament, even if its carried out on several animal species, including primates, under all conceivable conditions, can give any guarantee that the medicament tested in this way will behave the same in humans; because in many respects the human is not the same as the animal". Sir Ernst Boris Chain, Nobel Prize winner. From records of court case relating to Thalidomide: quoted by Dr Werner Hartinger in Civis International Foundation Report, No. 11, p.3.
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If their arguments are so powerful and their number so great, why has every major independent enquiry conducted in the last few years concluded that animal research is scientifically and medically useful?
Have you read them yourself? I took a particular interest in the House of Lords select committee evidence re 'Animals in Scientific Procedures' and it was obvious from the beginning and also via things said during evidence that the result was a foregone conclusion. http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld/ldanimal.htm
Just before New Labour came to power in 1997 they promised a Royal Commission into the validity of animal experiments although in fact scientific anti-vivisectionists are calling for an independent judicial inquiry into same so all the evidence can be in the public domain - however, neither has yet taken place.
You might be interested to know that to date 140 MPs have signed an early day motion calling for "the Government to facilitate an independent and transparent scientific evaluation of the use of animals as surrogate humans in drug safety testing and medical research." http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=28280
I always find it funny that every time the anti viv arguments fall flat on their face they seem to blame a conspiracy of bias and vested interests.
Tin foil hats anyone? maybe its the same neocon conspiracy that flew the planes into the WTC that have now ganged up to prevent "the truth" about vivisection getting out? or maybe, just maybe, the reason why every report comes out against you is because you repeatedly quote simplistic arguments and bad science.
stop blaming the establishment, and come up with realistic, evidence based and data supported research that stands up to peer review and the scientific community will listen to you!
anyone can write a "scientific paper" - writing one that stands up to scrutiny is where anti viv argumjents always fall down.
now, to pose a question to you - I've heard a lot about alternatives - If we do not fully understand the mechanism and mode of a disease, cancer being a good example, then how can we develop a non-animal model of that disease?
I'd also quote little foibles of science like the differing toxicity of drugs through different methods of administration (eg. the first pass metabolyte effects of paracetemol) something which would be impossible to recreate in a non-animal model, certianly impossible in cellular testing.
My, my, labrat99 what a lot of generalisation on the assumption that you are right and any dissent is wrong. Haven't you lot got a great deal of dna work to do? What about environmental particulants and build up in a living entity. Check various incinerator enquiries. I have been led to believe that some 20 years can pass before the build-up of toxins take on malignancy. How can a little oncomouse replicate such phenomena? PS The Animal Procedures Act states adherence to the 3 R's yet vested interests are also part of the government. This is a contest between scientists and who holds the purse-strings n'est pas?
Originally posted by floozie66: As Dr Festing said, you can't blame animal tests for not picking up adverse reactions. Its the purpose of human clinical trials to find out if the drugs are safe and if they work! Yes he really said that.. you were there on the web-chat and read it! Think about it. So what exactly IS the point of vivisection again??
Yes he really did say that and I hope everyone makes a mental note to remember that he did
Dr Simon Festing of course also went on to say "It is completely illogical to blame the small portion of the research that goes on in animals at a much earlier stage for when some problem later arises, which the human clinical trials did not detect." and I must say it seems rather more illogical to carry out such experiments on other species when clearly, as he admits, even results from humans cannot be scientifically/safely applied to other humans!
Originally posted by labrat99: I always find it funny that every time the anti viv arguments fall flat on their face they seem to blame a conspiracy of bias and vested interests.
Tin foil hats anyone? maybe its the same neocon conspiracy that flew the planes into the WTC that have now ganged up to prevent "the truth" about vivisection getting out? or maybe, just maybe, the reason why every report comes out against you is because you repeatedly quote simplistic arguments and bad science.
stop blaming the establishment, and come up with realistic, evidence based and data supported research that stands up to peer review and the scientific community will listen to you!
anyone can write a "scientific paper" - writing one that stands up to scrutiny is where anti viv argumjents always fall down.
now, to pose a question to you - I've heard a lot about alternatives - If we do not fully understand the mechanism and mode of a disease, cancer being a good example, then how can we develop a non-animal model of that disease?
I'd also quote little foibles of science like the differing toxicity of drugs through different methods of administration (eg. the first pass metabolyte effects of paracetemol) something which would be impossible to recreate in a non-animal model, certianly impossible in cellular testing.
OK then labrat (poor sod), lets simplify things even more! You give 1G of paracetamol orally to a mouse, a rat, a guinea pig, a monkey, and a six year old glaswegian.... What happens to each? The same thing? And given that you would not give it to the boy without testing it on the others first, how do you decide which result is going to be the same as giving it to the boy?? Tricky huh?
And the reason we always have a conspiracy theory of the mighty and powerful industries with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo, is cos they have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo! Think about it, why do people get so worked up about this? Is it cos if they don't win the argument creatures continue to suffer in labs, or cos they have shares in spending hours protesting in the cold and rain??
I see that there was only a gap of 4 minutes between CatrinaC's post and that of labrat99. I hope by now that CatrinaC's excellent referrals are being looked up by doubters (assuming they really want to know). I often wonder about the age of people who seem so brainwashed that they are unable to discern when money is doing the talking. It probably is to do with the education of a certain generation which leads them to accept an oft-touted authoritarian view of something. Still, they'll learn, one hopes.
Originally posted by jesuswasanactivist: My, my, labrat99 what a lot of generalisation on the assumption that you are right and any dissent is wrong. Haven't you lot got a great deal of dna work to do? What about environmental particulants and build up in a living entity. Check various incinerator enquiries. I have been led to believe that some 20 years can pass before the build-up of toxins take on malignancy. How can a little oncomouse replicate such phenomena? PS The Animal Procedures Act states adherence to the 3 R's yet vested interests are also part of the government. This is a contest between scientists and who holds the purse-strings n'est pas?
where have I said dissent is wrong? I only said come up with realistic data and be prepared to back it up!
you polint out malignancy building up over 20 years, well, at least with a mouse you can give it 1000 times the human exposure for its entire lifespan - its not conclusive proof but it gives good data to fit in with the other information that you have available- whats the laternative, give a human an overdose to establish what the safe amount is.
As I've said on another thread, researchers see animal data as ojust one part of their toolkit (with in-vitro, computer and clinical trial data) rather than a panacea - it allows a pucture of evidence to be built up as to the likely effects of something. on its own animal data is worthless, as is cellular data, and indeed as is human data - its worthless because you just cannot realistically replicate the circumstances in humans (eg looking at the effects of an overdose, how can you ethically suggest that we do that on human volunteers?)
OK then labrat (poor sod), lets simplify things even more! You give 1G of paracetamol orally to a mouse, a rat, a guinea pig, a monkey, and a six year old glaswegian.... What happens to each? The same thing? And given that you would not give it to the boy without testing it on the others first, how do you decide which result is going to be the same as giving it to the boy?? Tricky huh?
Well, for a start, giving 1 Gramme of paracetemol to a mouse would be the equivalent of giving about a kilogramme of the stuff to a child!
the mechanism of what happens to the paracetemol in each of them is the same, however if you decided to give it intravenously rather than orally the effects would be quite different - thats the advantage of animal testing, you can do stuff to find things out - would you like your 6 year old boy to be the forst ever living being to recieve that drug by that route of administration, if you could not guarantee that the effects would be the same as what was predicted from previous human data?
