Often, poor translation from animals to humans means that the treatment does not produce clinical benefit in humans at all, or causes minor side effects that are not detected in animals.
But sometimes, the consequences are disastrous — like when five human volunteers took experimental drug floxuridine Died of liver damage, despite the drug being shown to be safe in trials in mice, rats, dogs and monkeys at doses hundreds of times higher than those used.
In the field of neurology, the relevance of animal experiments to humans is particularly low.
one potential application Neuralink’s device is treating Alzheimer’s patients, but history is littered with examples of animals being “cured” of artificially induced Alzheimer’s-like diseases, just to be “cured” Human clinical trials fail. Also applies to stroke with muscular dystrophydespite decades of intensive research in animals, no effective treatment or cure exists.
simulated
Recent developments in science and technology have seen an explosion of cutting-edge research that advances knowledge without harming animals.
Brain organoids — “mini brains” derived from human cells and grown in the lab — have been used extensively to understand human brain biology and disease, and to test the effectiveness of treatments.
Brain organoids from Alzheimer’s patients Spontaneously develop features of the disorder So probably a better model of disease than animals.
Earlier this year, in a paper that sounded more sci-fi than science, Australian scientists described embedded Human cell-derived neural networks In a simulated world modeled after the arcade game Pong. These networks are not only able to play the game, but also improve their performance in response to feedback.
trial
Musk is often cited as a paradigm breaker, but his company’s adherence to the age-old paradigm of animal testing shows a lack of imagination.
We understand that regulators often require the results of animal testing before allowing a drug or device to go into human clinical trials – scientists at Cruelty Free International are working to change this by working with authorities to find ways to use fewer or no animals Safe way to conduct human trials.
However, we see no reason for the seemingly excessive animal testing performed by Neuralink. Since 2018, the company has experimented with and killed about 1,500 animals, according to the company. Reuters article.
Neuralink insists that it only conducts “confirmative” testing on animals, and only when all other options have been exhausted. There is evidence that the company performed exploratory surgery and actively tried to cover it up.
Reuters described how employees were ordered to retroactively remove the word “explore” from the title of the study and avoid using it in the future. By contrast, rival company Synchron has taken its device to human clinical trials after testing it on about 80 animals — still more than 80, but a vast improvement over Neuralink’s 1,500 animals, And it’s still increasing.
no animal ingredients
Neuralink is a high-profile example of animals suffering and dying in vain, but the problem is by no means unique to the company or the United States. UK laboratories perform around 3 million tests on animals each year, of which at least 150,000 we consider to have widely accepted non-animal alternatives or to be redundant.
The latter figure does not include the massive number of animal experiments conducted to study recreational drug use, duplicating existing work, or causing extreme harm to the animals involved, not to mention the millions or more of excess animals each bred and killed up. Years were not even used for experiments.
For the sake of scientific advancement and animals in the lab, we need a plan to accelerate the transition to animal-free research and testing, which is where Cruelty Free International’s #TargetZero movement comes in.
In the UK, we are calling on the UK government to develop an ambitious strategy to end animal testing, led by a dedicated ministerial position.Compassionate UK citizens can support our campaign by: write to their congressman.
The future of science is without animals, and we urge Musk and others to adopt non-animal methods and usher in that future as soon as possible.
the author
Laura Alvarez is Director of Science Policy and Regulation at Cruelty Free International.
