We need better than animal derived drugs
Chopped up pig pancreas may not sound appetizing. But most
cystic fibrosis patients eat a refined version of it every breakfast, lunch and dinner - five large capsules a meal - to supply enzymes
their own bodies do not produce.
The pills are life-sustaining for people with cystic fibrosis, a
hereditary disease that attacks the lungs and digestive tract and affects 70,000 people worldwide.
Some patients may object to the source of the drug on moral or
religious grounds. But there have also been longstanding concerns about the health implications of obtaining enzymes from animal
sources, according to Dr. Leslie Hendeles, a University of Florida professor of pharmacy and pediatrics who has studied them.
"What would happen if there were a virus, a pig virus, something
analogous to Mad Cow disease?" Hendeles asked.
The recent recall in the United States and Europe of the blood thinner
heparin, whose main ingredient comes from pig intestines and which has
been linked to 19 deaths, has raised public awareness that even in the
age of sophisticated bioengineering, certain crucial medicines are
still derived from animal parts - even if, as it turns out, the
heparin problem has nothing to do with the pigs.
History has shown that the risk of transmitting disease from
animal-based drugs, while small, is not just theoretical, according to Dr. Paul Brown, formerly a senior investigator at the U.S. National
Institutes of Health.
"Anytime you take a tissue or an extract process from a tissue from
one species and put it into a another species or even another animal,
you run the risk of unwanted pathogens that you didn't know were
there; that's been responsible for repeated problems over the course
of time," Brown said. "If you can do something without taking tissue
or a product from another being, you're ahead of the game."