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Asked by anon-353598 on 16 Mar 2023.
Question: Do u do animal testing?and if so why ?
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Thomas Swift answered on 16 Mar 2023:
I don’t. But I know a lot of people who do.
They work on life saving drugs that could cure cancers and save lives – however these drugs are also very toxic and can make you very ill if administered wrong. They prefer to test mice to check the drugs are not poisonous – rather than accidentally poisoning people getting the dosage right or checking that it doesn’t hurt them.
They go through a lot to make sure the mice are comfortable as possible – and they use the smallest possible numbers of mice whilst still being confident their test result is real.
Many researchers are not happy about this but it is a legal requirement to show your proposed new medicine is safe before it can be used in a person. Unless we can pursuade politicians to change the law there is no alternative.
However, I am glad, that we no longer test cosmetic products or carry out other non-medical tests on animals any more.
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Maryam Sani answered on 17 Mar 2023:
No, my work has never involved testing on animals. I know that there are some important benefits but it is a decision that I wasn’t prepared to make.
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Rebecca Woods answered on 24 Mar 2023:
I don’t test anything on animals, but I understand why scientist have to.
When doing research on/with animals there are special requirements, including ethics forms/commities, getting licences from the home office, ensuring the highest levels of animal welfare throughout etc.
Researchers don’t want to work on/with animals, however most deam it a “necessary evil”. There’s load of work going on to find replacement technology for animal testing, but when it is deamed necessary, they work under the 3R’s (Reduction, Refinement and Replacement).
Every scientific paper I have read that used animals has a declaration of animal welfare/licences where applicable. -
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