Dr Ian Hampson writes: The debate on animal testing in medical research is extremely controversial due mostly to the wide spectrum of viewpoints on this subject. For example, there are the infamous extremists who carry out illegal forms of terrorism in the name of this cause and which actually do more harm than good. Indeed it is quite clear that this type of activity will polarise the viewpoint of most of society against their beliefs. Yet there is a case to be made for restricting animal testing to the bare minimum that is needed and that is the underlying principle of the Caring Cancer Trust. This viewpoint is not without precedent as the Medical Research Council, The Home Office, The Wellcome Trust and several large multinational drug companies now support the National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction (NC3R’s) of the use of animals in research. Clearly there are real concerns over this practice and the Caring Cancer Trust have seen in the forefront of the campaign to eliminate animal tested research for the past decade for both moral and scientific reasons.
The development of new human organ and tissue culture laboratory methods provides a viable alternative to animals for early stage testing of new cancer therapies. Indeed they may even be more accurate as it is undisputed that many prospective cancer drugs which work well in animals, do not work in humans. It is important to realise that this new technology is not based on human embryo stem cells but rather the culturing of human cells obtained with ethical consent from adults.
In the foreseeable future it is regrettably quite clear that nobody is going to put a drug into humans that has not been through some animal testing but the Caring Cancer Trust simply believes that this should be kept to a bare minimum until it can be phased out altogether.
Ian Hampson
