libby@cca.UUCP (11/21/86)
>> Take the following two examples. By a structure-function >>relationship, Thalidomide should be perfectly safe. As a matter of fact, >>it is perfectly safe - in rabbits, and in humans beyond 20 weeks gestation. >> Or take Dioxin, this should also be a fairly innocuous compound. >>It does not induce mutagenesis in bacteria and is fairly stable. Rats >>and certain strains of mice can literally eat it by the pound, but just >>a few millionths of a gram will kill a guinea pig (or is it a gerbil). > It seems to me these are very GOOD reasons *NOT* to rely on animal testing for valid assumptions about human reactions to drugs, etc. There are lots of animals suffering in these horrible experiments, only to arrive at results like the above. "Does it cause cancer in rabbits?" "Yes." "Can we assume it causes cancer in humans, then?" "Uh...I can't say." What the heck are all these animals dying for? Rather useless information, and potentially dangerous assumptions. And as far as household cleaners, and the like. My great-grandmother in Italy was cleaning her house with the same chemicals I am using today: bleach, lye, etc. She didn't need someone to stick lye in a rabbit's eye to tell her that it was dangerous stuff and that skin contact should be avoided. And neither do I. Have they really added any new chemicals to the household-cleaning and make-up arsenal in the past 20 years? If so, why? The old ones work fine. And if not (new and improved = ga ga, in my opinion) then why are they continuing to torture animals with repetitive tests. At any rate, thanks to Julie for sharing her list of good-and-evil manufact- urers with us. I will not be buying very many of the same products I used to. For those of you who care, make your dollars talk! Corporations that don't know the meaning of the word "ethics" are still very tuned in to the word "money".
zdenek@heathcliff.columbia.edu.UUCP (11/23/86)
In article <11244@cca.UUCP> libby@cca.UUCP (Libby Sackett) writes: > >It seems to me these are very GOOD reasons *NOT* to rely on animal testing >for valid assumptions about human reactions to drugs, etc. You are right, we can't absolutely rely on animal testing (although we can get some useful data out of it). But what's your suggestion for alternative test objects. Do you want to test on people??? >And as far as household cleaners, and the like. My great-grandmother in >Italy was cleaning her house with the same chemicals I am using today: Your great-grandmother (or my great-grandmother for that matter) lived in quite different society. I doubt that she had access to the same medicine, cosmetic products, household products and other chemicals you can find around today. I also doubt that she had comparable guarantees as far as safety of the products is concerned. We don't use ALL of the chemicals used, say, 50 years ago. We keep using ONLY those that (as far as we can tell) are SAFE. >bleach, lye, etc. She didn't need someone to stick lye in a rabbit's eye >to tell her that it was dangerous stuff and that skin contact should be >avoided. And neither do I. Hmmm... You just simply KNOW it! That's not bad. Here is what you should do. Write to all the labs that perform animal tests and let them know that you can tell them if the tested chemicals are safe or dangerous. That way they can save the poor animals and everybody's going to be happy. As always oversimplifying the problem is not going to help us. I don't think there is a lab that performs animal tests just for the sake of being cruel to the animals. Our society demands new products, new medicine etc., and it also demands that these products are safe. Animal testing is just one of the implications. My great-great-grandmother probably didn't even know what make-up was, so it would have been OK for her to say "There is no reason to test these cosmetic products on animals"... Have you never used any cosmetic products? Do you want them to be safe? If yes then what do you suggest as a solution to go for those who want to provide you with what you want? While it's relatively easy to say "forget about all the new cosmetic and household products", what about medicine? We could talk about "ethics" forever. Do we want to understand human body? The answer is yes. But what if the only way to answer a particular question is to cut something that is alive? There are only a few solutions. We can cut people, we can cut something else (alive), or we have to forget about the original question. What's the answer now??? I know, you just KNOW the answer. Now, I am not advocating excessive animal tests. At the same time I realize that I'm not a hermit. I am using the products and I want them to be safe and I am aware of possible implications. I want to be able to ask a doctor for help. To say that we can put all the data we have into a computer and have it figure out what's safe and what not is naive and childish. To use all the advances of our age and to say that animal tests should be illegal is just drooling. zdenek zdenek@cs.columbia.edu or ...!seismo!columbia!cs!zdenek
bzs@bu-cs.UUCP (11/23/86)
C'mon zdenek, you're twisting Libby Sackett's comments out of all proportion and being unnecessarily sarcastic to wit. She simply said that she thought one can do a fine job of cleaning a house using the same stuff (lye, bleach, soap) that her grandmother used and wondered to what extent these companies are testing ingredients we are all quite familiar with (eg. lye, she mentioned that specifically) or introducing new ingredients simply to be able to say they have something "new and improved", but of dubious value to get the tub scrubbed. It wouldn't matter that they do except that the point is that in so doing they engage in possibly cruel and likely (a priori) unnecessary animal testing. She's simply saying that if that is the cost then thanks but no thanks. You drag in things like medicines to make your point, no one was arguing about that so it's moot. The whole point was the testing of things of clearly dubious value, like a new fragrance additive for dishwashing soap. Boy, I hate the technique on these lists of dragging someone's point all over the place until one has suitably constructed a straw man to knock down. Maybe we should have a moratorium on paragraphs which begin with "Oh yeah? Then what if..." which almost invariably is followed by something the original poster never said nor intended, but provides an easy target for the respondent. Here's to intellectual honesty... >>And as far as household cleaners, and the like. My great-grandmother in >>Italy was cleaning her house with the same chemicals I am using today: > >Our society demands new products, new medicine >etc., and it also demands that these products are safe. QED. -Barry Shein, Boston University
jsdy@hadron.UUCP (Joseph S. D. Yao) (11/24/86)
Not all chemicals that our grandfolks used are available to us now.
A couple of counterexamples: mercury and carbon tetrachloride used
to be widely used in, respectively, hattery and dry cleaning, even
at home. Cases of toxicity were noticed; studies of toxic levels
were done; and now you can't buy those at Mayor Bunsen's hardware
store anymore.
--
Joe Yao hadron!jsdy@seismo.{CSS.GOV,ARPA,UUCP}
jsdy@hadron.COM (not yet domainised)zdenek@heathcliff.columbia.edu.UUCP (11/24/86)
In article <2627@bu-cs.BU.EDU> bzs@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Barry Shein) writes: > > ....The whole point was the testing of >things of clearly dubious value, like a new fragrance additive for >dishwashing soap. I couldn't agree any more. As far as I am concerned all the cosmetic products are of dubious value. I personally use probably only one kind of soap and I hate when they have more than one brand of toothpaste and I have to chose. It's all the same stuff anyway. But that wasn't my point. >You drag in things like medicines to make your point, no one was >arguing about that so it's moot..... >Maybe we should have a moratorium on paragraphs which begin with "Oh >yeah? Then what if..." which almost invariably is followed by >something the original poster never said nor intended, but provides an >easy target for the respondent. I have no means of finding out what the original poster INTENDED to say, but I surely know what was POSTED. Reread the original article again before wasting too much time with unique ideas. I drag in things like medicine? Could you please explain the intent of the following? >>It seems to me these are very GOOD reasons *NOT* to rely on animal testing >>for valid assumptions about human reactions to drugs, etc. There are lots >>of animals suffering in these horrible experiments.... >>What the heck are all these animals dying for? Rather useless information, >>and potentially dangerous assumptions. I read this as <animal reactions differ from human reactions, we can't rely on those results, therefore testing drugs etc. on animals is useless>. Sorry if I misunderstood... Also, just in the case you missed that, the poster of the article you defend edited the Subject line and changed it from "Re: Animal testing for Cosmetic and Household products" to "Re: Animal testing: are results valid for human comparisons at all?". I must have misunderstood the intent in this case, too. Anyway, my point was that it is necessary to first analyse the problem (at least a little bit, please) and then complain and bitch. So far all the proposals I have heard about animal testing were the same, namely Stop it! I haven't heard anybody saying "let's convince all the women that by not using say lipsticks they can prevent cruel animal tests". It's OK to produce, watch and even stomach (I'm affraid some people must believe that crap) all the stupid and mindless commercials about new products, it's OK to buy the products. There is no problem with using new shampoos, make-ups and I don't know what else one could use. It's fine that all these people require that the stuff is safe. But to test it on animals is bad. I am sick of irrational arguments. Enough said. zdenek zdenek@cs.columbia.edu or ...!seismo!columbia!cs!zdenek
werner@aecom.UUCP (11/24/86)
In article <11244@cca.UUCP>, libby@cca.UUCP (Libby Sackett) writes: > My examples: > >> Take the following two examples. By a structure-function > >>relationship, Thalidomide should be perfectly safe. As a matter of fact, > > >> Or take Dioxin, this should also be a fairly innocuous compound. > >>It does not induce mutagenesis in bacteria and is fairly stable. Rats > It seems to me these are very GOOD reasons *NOT* to rely on animal testing > for valid assumptions about human reactions to drugs, etc. There are lots > of animals suffering in these horrible experiments, only to arrive at > results like the above. "Does it cause cancer in rabbits?" "Yes." "Can > we assume it causes cancer in humans, then?" "Uh...I can't say." As much as I hate to be involved in run-on discussions, I also hate to be misinterpreted or misunderstood. The logical leap that Libby Sackett makes in response to my examples is essentially unjustified. There is a long experience to suggest that most chemicals that are harmful in a proper animal model are in fact harmful to humans. Furthermore, interspecies differences in reaction provide an insight into the mechanism and action of compounds. It is the converse that is not true: just because something is safe in animals does not mean it is safe in humans. However, anything harmful to animals should be considered harmful to humans until proven otherwise (and frankly I don't think the effort to prove otherwise is generally undertaken). One can never completely eliminate animal research. There is some, admittedly, that is redundant and unneccesaary, but one cannot generalize. One cannot generalize! -- Craig Werner (MD/PhD '91) !philabs!aecom!werner (1935-14E Eastchester Rd., Bronx NY 10461, 212-931-2517) "If you've heard this story before, don't stop me. I want to hear it again."
clewis@spectrix.UUCP (Chris Lewis) (11/25/86)
In article <11244@cca.UUCP> libby@cca.UUCP (Libby Sackett) writes: > > >>> Take the following two examples. By a structure-function >>>relationship, Thalidomide should be perfectly safe. As a matter of fact, >>>it is perfectly safe - in rabbits, and in humans beyond 20 weeks gestation. > >>> Or take Dioxin, this should also be a fairly innocuous compound. >>>It does not induce mutagenesis in bacteria and is fairly stable. Rats >>>and certain strains of mice can literally eat it by the pound, but just >>>a few millionths of a gram will kill a guinea pig (or is it a gerbil). >> > >It seems to me these are very GOOD reasons *NOT* to rely on animal testing >for valid assumptions about human reactions to drugs, etc. There are lots >of animals suffering in these horrible experiments, only to arrive at >results like the above. "Does it cause cancer in rabbits?" "Yes." "Can >we assume it causes cancer in humans, then?" "Uh...I can't say." The US FDA says: "if a drug causes cancer in rats, we're not gonna certify it for human use". Remember Saccharin? Because, if a chemical does do something nasty to animals, it'll *probably* do something equally nasty to human beings. And "probably" is good enough. And it's evil (to use your terminology) to perform tests in that scale on human beings to find out for sure - Hitler's Germany did such testing. And, in the case of things like Saccharin, it's extremely difficult to detect that a drug is doing nasty things. Saccharin, (If I remember correctly) was guessed at being capable of causing a couple of cancers per *million* people. You want to do testing on humans on that big a scale? How? Or (as they do with rats) extremely high dosage testing for several generations? If doing this testing on animals is unethical - what's doing the same on human beings? Don't give me any nonsense about tissue cultures or computers. They simply *won't* catch problems that subtle. OF COURSE, killing thousands of animals to determine that Chlorox is corrosive is stupid and cruel. But blanket condemnation of all animal testing is equally so (to the people suffering from the conditions the drug is being researched in the first place). Fortunately, most Universities have ethics committees that review test plans before allowing researchers to perform tests on animals or people. Perhaps the cosmetics industry should be forced to clear test plans with a government body that evaluates testing for reasonability. -- Chris Lewis Spectrix Microsystems Inc, UUCP: {utzoo|utcs|yetti|genat|seismo}!mnetor!spectrix!clewis ARPA: mnetor!spectrix!clewis@seismo.css.gov Phone: (416)-474-1955
bzs@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Barry Shein) (11/25/86)
>Fortunately, most Universities have ethics >committees that review test plans before allowing researchers to perform >tests on animals or people. Perhaps the cosmetics industry should be forced >to clear test plans with a government body that evaluates testing for >reasonability. >-- >Chris Lewis This is true, UNfortunately these committees are usually rather lax, (this is first hand, I've worked in and around such labs at some well known places) regardless of what they may be on paper. Having seen it first hand I would tend to tolerate some of the "extremists" on the subject, perhaps they will at least goad the others to clean up their house before some scandals cause them some real troubles. I think people idealize the situation, I haven't heard any defenses from people who have actually worked in these labs, I suspect they'd mostly rather forget the whole thing. More importantly, I think the conversation was specifically directed at unnecessary testing, such as on products we probably already know are harmful. Not medicines or new things (except perhaps new things of dubious value, like a cheaper formulation to make your dishwasher detergent smell "lemony!".) Animal testing motivated by vague fears of litigation rather than adding to the base of scientific knowledge. I have little doubt that our choice is either we engage in certain animal testing, or we stop right here (a choice some advocate.) I also have little doubt that those of us with compassion for animals would like to know that such testing is done as humanely as possible. I fear that it isn't. -Barry Shein, Boston University