The Labour Party have published their new Animal Welfare Manifesto which impacts on Patients Campaigning for Cures in its final section titled ‘Animals Used in Research’.
We are encouraged to read that this section opens with a pledge to review the 1986 Animals in Scientific Procedures Act (ASPA) and we will be applying to be part of that review.
The ASPA is outdated legislation which permits valuable medical research funding to license experiments on animals, that are claimed able to find treatments and cures for humans. We now know that this claim is entirely false. So the entire ASPA is based on now proven false science.
The 1986 ASPA is outdated because it predates the crucial 2003 Human Genome Project, which provides the final seal on decades of peer reviewed scientific evidence confirming the failure of animal experiments in the search for human treatments and cures. Our piece in the New Statesman explains the significance of the Human Genome project in more detail.
It is ironic that Labour’s Manifesto opens by calling for a review of the outdated ASPA, because the rest of the Manifesto’s text confines itself entirely to the limitations imposed by the ASPA. These limitations are deeply unscientific, falling line with animal modelers and 3Rs’ organisations such as Cruelty Free International and the RSPCA. For example, the Manifesto commits ‘to a stringent review of defined areas in regulatory testing, with the aim of immediately identifying and eliminating avoidable tests.’ This suggests that there are many areas of animal-based toxicity testing which are viable for humans and do not need to be avoided. This in turn ignores the fact that animal-based toxicity testing is now clearly demonstrated to be an unmitigated disaster for human patients. To suggest otherwise is very serious and medically negligent. [1]
The Manifesto also talks about ‘ending within an achievable timeframe, the permitting of ‘severe’ suffering as defined in UK legislation, with a long-term objective to phase out animal testing entirely’. Calling for animal testing to be gradually ‘phased out’ is the stagnant ‘reduction’ aspect of the 3Rs: an outdated policy established in 1959 for ‘humane experimental technique on animals’. The 3Rs entirely ignores the fact 90% of animal testing is now widely reported to be failing in human clinical trials. [2] It ignores the fact that the National Cancer Institute says we have lost cures for cancer because studies in rodents have been believed. [3] And it ignores the British Medical Journal’s report on the failure of animal modeling in the search for human treatments and cures. [4] But above all, it ignores our top science experts who have named Trans-Species Modeling Theory (TSMT) as a water tight scientific Theory to join Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. TSMT explains today how we now understand why animal models are such a failure for human patients. [5]
It seems to us that the Labour Party are still in the grip of outdated advisers who do not address animal experimentation as a claimed medical endeavour for human patients. So-called animal protection organisations have a vested interest in the 3Rs, upon which their campaigns are built over many years. They are doing more harm than good in their grip on great Labour, who established the irreplaceable national treasure which is the NHS.
The good news is that Labour are suggesting a review of the failed 1986 ASPA. This is potentially a very valuable action and we will apply to help Labour understand the scientific aspects of what the ASPA actually represents.
References
1. Lumley CE, Walker S Lancaster, Quay, editors, 1990, ‘Clinical Toxicity – Could it have been predicted? Post-marketing experience’, 57–67; Heywood R. Animal Toxicity Studies: Their Relevance for Man.
2.FDA Issues Advice to Make Earliest Stages Of Clinical Drug Development More Efficient. FDA, June 2006 [cited March 7, 2010].
4. BMJ 2014; 348: g 3719 (available here)
5. Shanks N, Greek R Animal Models in Light of Evolution Boca Raton: Brown Walker Press; 2009.