Stories
From the World's Press
Animal
lobby forces Foot Guards to look for alternative bearskins
Taken
from the Daily Telegraph on 11 March 2003.
For two
centuries the Sovereign's Foot Guards have been distinguished by the foot-high
bearskins that top their scarlet ceremonial uniforms.
But now,
to appease animal rights campaigners, defence officials are seeking an alternative
to the traditional headgear, which dates back to the Battle of Waterloo.
Complaints
to the Queen that her soldiers should switch to faux fur have resulted in
a search for a synthetic bearskin - so far without success. The bearskin,
first worn by the Foot Guards in recognition of their 1815 defeat of the French
Imperial Guard (who also wore bearskins), is made from the skins of Ursus
Americanus, Canada's Black Bear.
Currently
around 2,500 are in service with the Grenadier, Welsh, Irish, Scots and Coldstream
Guards regiments. But letters to the Queen, imploring her to stop using real
bearskin, have led to a rethink. "We have tried artificial fibres to
try and get away from using bearskins," said Lt Col Peter Dick-Peter.
"But nothing works. It either doesn't hold its shape, or it cannot withstand
the weather, or it
fails to retain the right colour, or it stands up in a very surprised manner
in the wrong electrical conditions".
Artificial
bearskins, using nylon and dyed sheepskin have failed. They have been found
to look too red in strong sunlight, too spiky in wet weather, produce too
much static electricity and distort in strong winds. "We have trialled
some but nothing has been found," said Lt Col Dick-Peter. He stressed
that the bearskins were from culled bears. "Because the black bear is
running a bit rife in Canada they have to cull them to keep the numbers down
because they get too dangerous. We buy the culled pelts and use them for the
caps. The industry is aware we are looking at alternatives to bearskin. There
is no real reason why we shouldn't transfer to something which looked the
same, did the same job, but wasn't made of bearskin."
The latest
to complain is Miss Great Britain, Yana Booth, who yesterday wrote to the
Queen on behalf of Peta, (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) saying
that her Guards wore "the world's cruellest crowns" and asking her
to request the use of a "suitable faux fur fabric". The organisation
claims that it takes the entire hide of one, or even two, bears to make one
guard's headpiece.
Today's
bearskin cap has its origins in the Grenadier Mitre cap, which, in 1712, replaced
the three-cornered tricorn hat when it was discovered that for a Grenadier
to throw his grenade, he had to sling his firelock across his back, which
invariably resulted in his hat being knocked off. A Royal Warrant in 1768
stipulated that the cap had to be made of black bearskin. The cap as it is
today was introduced after the First Regiment of Foot Guards, having defeated
Napolean's Guard, were given the privilege of having the whole regiment wear
the bearskin.
The female
bear's glossier, smoother pelt usually provides the officers' bearskin, while
the male's rougher pelt is used for other ranks. Hollow, and therefore surprisingly
light, each bearskin is moulded on a bamboo frame. Each cap is individual,
and so durable that many are passed from father to son. In general the bearskin
"should look like an apple in front, and a pear from the back".
Grooming is done
with a damp towel. The traditional method of drying is to hang the bearskin
out of the barrack room window on a broomstick.
Less meat
'means a longer life'
Taken
from the BBC News website on March 11 2003.
Eating little
or no meat can help people live longer, researchers have found. Their lives
are "significantly longer" than the general population, researchers
have found, according to German scientists. It has been suggested that eating
a balanced vegetarian diet could reduce the risk of developing certain cancers
and heart disease, cut cholesterol levels and the chances of suffering from
kidney and gall stones, diet-related diabetes and high blood pressure.
A team from
the Centre of Cancer Research in Germany monitored almost 2,000 people aged
between 10 and 70, who ate either no meat, or less than average between 1978
and 1999.
Those studied
were either vegans, who eat no meat, fish, eggs or dairy products, vegetarians,
who eat eggs and dairy products, but no meat or fish, and occasional meat
eaters.
Across the
group, there was an average of 59 deaths for every 100 deaths in that age
range in the general population during that period. But completely avoiding
meat was not the healthiest diet, the researchers found.
For every
100 deaths among vegans, there were 66 among vegetarians and 60 among occasional
meat eaters. Amongst smokers, the mortality rate was 70% higher than non-smokers,
while those who took the most exercise reduced their mortality rates by more
than 30%. Moderate alcohol made no discernible difference to lifespan, the
researchers concluded.
Dr Jenny
Chang-Claude, of the Centre of Cancer Research, said: "Essentially, the
key issue here is having a properly balanced diet."
Activists
win conference cancellation
Taken
from the East Anglian Daily Times on 10th March 2003.
A conference
to be attended by staff from Huntingdon Life Sciences – the East Anglian
research firm targeted by animal rights campaigners – has been called
off after pressure on the owner of the venue. The decision comes just days
after Deloitte and Touche, one of the world's leading accountancy firms, quit
as auditors for Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS) following pressure from campaigners.
The Citywest
Hotel in Dublin was invaded last week by members of Stop Huntingdon Animal
Cruelty (SHAC), the main group trying to close down HLS – which has laboratories
in Occold, near Eye, and in Cambridgeshire. The activists also let off stink
bombs and jammed the hotel's switchboard with protest calls. Citywest Hotel
had been due to host a conference organised by the Institute of Animal Technicians
(IAT), a professional organisation whose members are in charge of the animals
used in research laboratories. But it
was revealed yesterday the event, scheduled for April 10 and 11, had been
cancelled.
An HLS spokesman
said the cancellation would hit scheduled discussions about the future of
animal welfare in research establishments. "Most of the Institute's members
are from academia and our staff comprise only a small fraction of the total
membership," he added. IAT spokeswoman, Ann Shaw, said the cancellation
was due to "violence and intimidation" by a handful of extremists.
"The hotel has
cancelled the booking due to attacks on its facilities, staff and guests by
anonymous animal rights extremists who claim that frightening people enjoying
a Sunday trip to the hotel with their families and friends was fun,"
she added.
Ms Shaw
pointed out members of the institute were committed to animal welfare. SHAC
spokeswoman, Natasha Avery, said Citywest Hotel had been put under "relentless"
pressure to cancel the conference. "The cancellation has occurred despite
leading UK scientists and directors of pharmaceutical companies writing many
letters appealing for the hotel to withstand the pressure. It is a real slap
in
the face for the industry," she added.
The conference
will be re-scheduled for later in the year at an alternative venue. A spokeswoman
for Citywest Hotel confirmed the conference had been cancelled, but declined
to comment further.
£5 for every hedgehog
saved from extermination
Taken
from The Independent Newspaper on 11th March 2003.
Conservationists
fighting to save the lives of up to 5,000 hedgehogs facing a cull in the Western
Isles have put a £5 price on the head of each animal saved from extermination.
The offer
of the bounty comes as the British Hedgehog Preservation Society was to make
a last minute appeal to the Scottish Parliament's Petitions Committee today.
Scottish
National Heritage (SNH) believes a cull by lethal injection is vital if wading
birds on North Uist, Benbecula and South Uist are to be protected from egg-scavenging
hedgehogs, blamed for reducing some bird colonies by up to 60 per cent in
the last 30 years. Next month SNH plans to exterminate up to 300 of the animals
on North Uist.
But a coalition
of animal rights groups have promised to hand over the reward for every hedgehog
brought to a holding centre. The animals will be relocated on the mainland.
The groups
raised more than £75,000 to fund the operation. "Local residents
know the islands and know where the hedgehogs are, and we believe they are
the best people to catch them," said Ross Minett, campaigns director
for Animals for Advocates. "We are going to meet with elders on Uist
this week to discuss offering some sort of financial incentive to either local
individuals who bring hedgehogs into us or to some worthwhile local cause.
"We want to
make sure the local community is supportive of what we are doing. We are offering
training to anybody wanting to take up our offer and bring in hedgehogs so
that we can save them from officials for SNH who will be be trying to collect
the animals to kill them. "There is no reason for a single Uist hedgehog
to be killed."
However
experts working with SNH say that few of the Uist hedgehogs would survive
the move and that such an operation could cause unnecessary suffering to the
animals and disrupt existing hedgehop populations on the mainland.
Govt trials
safer medicines program
A program
designed to reduce the incidence of adverse reactions to medications will
be trialled in regional Australia. Federal Health Minister Kay Patterson said
the electronic initiative, known as MediConnect, could provide health-care
professionals with a simple way of knowing which medicines consumers were
using. "It has the potential to save thousands of people unnecessary
pain and suffering, and at the same time to reduce costs to consumers, hospitals
and government," Senator Patterson said.
MediConnect
would be a secure national electronic system drawing together a person's medicines
information from different doctors, pharmacies and hospital. Patients would
have to consent to their information being used. Senator Patterson said the
system would provide doctors and pharmacists with more complete information
about consumers' medicines, helping promote safer prescribing and management
of medicines. The program will be trialled in Launceston and Ballarat.
Police
and MI5 tapping of phones and emails doubles under Labour
Taken
from the Guardian Newspaper.
Interception
of telephone calls, email and post by police and the intelligence services
has more than doubled since Labour came to power and is higher than at any
time since the start of the second world war, according to research to be
published this week. The total number of communications surveillance warrants
issued in England, Wales and Scotland has risen from 1,370 in 1996 to 3,427
in 2001, in stark contrast to official figures which claim that the number
has fallen significantly in recent years.
By comparison,
the previous peak year was 1940, during the Second World War, when 1,682 warrants
were issued. Even these figures massively underestimate the true scale of
interception, according to Statewatch, an independent civil liberties group,
which conducted the analysis.
Changes
in the method of counting warrants for the official figures as well as changes
in how they are issued mean that the total is likely to be "much, much
greater", the research concludes. Tony Bunyan, editor of Statewatch,
said: "The official figures are a travesty. The new method of issuing
warrants and changes to them is said to make life easier for officials, but
at the same time it hides from public view the true extent of surveillance."
Richard
Allan, Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, said: "Sometimes it is
necessary to intercept communications, especially given the current terrorist
threat. But it is incumbent on any government in a free society to be open
about how they are intercepting people's communications so that we all know
the rules of the game."
The research
comes as David Blunkett, the home secretary, faces another blow to his communications
surveillance plans. Last night MPs comprehensively rejected Home Office moves
to require phone and Internet companies to stockpile customer records for
long periods so that the data is available for law enforcement.
Ministers
insist that data retention is a crucial part of the fight against terrorism
and serious crime, but an inquiry by the all-party internet group concluded
that the system - rejected by both the communications industry and the official
privacy watchdog, the information commissioner- would be unworkable and probably
illegal. "Fundamentally, we do not believe that it is practical to retain
all communications data on the off-chance that it will be useful one day,"
the MPs conclude.
According
to the annual report of the interception of communications commissioner, the
senior judge responsible for retrospective monitoring of communications surveillance,
the number of warrants issued in England, Wales and Scotland fell from 1,900
in 2000 to 1,445 in2001 a period covering the aftermath of the September 11
terror attacks. But the figures do not take into account modifications to
warrants, such as a change to the target's address or telephone number.
Rise in
teen vegetarians rattles beef producers
Taken
from the Washington Post.
Teenagers
are cutting the meat from their diets, and that trend alarms the nation's
beef producers, who recently targeted an education campaign at teen girls.
"I just didn't think that eating meat could be that healthy for you,"
said Jennifer Mora, a Des Moines, Iowa, high school senior who quit eating
meat and fish when she was13. "I think we can get all the nutrients we
need from other sources, like eggs, nuts, other foods.
"One
in four teen-agers now considers vegetarianism "cool," according
to Teenage Research Unlimited, a market research group. Two percent of teens
ate no meat, poultry or fish in 2000, and 6 percent of teen girls ate no beef
or pork, according to a poll sponsored by the Baltimore-based Vegetarian Resource
Group.
That's bad
news for states such as Iowa, a major pork and beef producer. People for the
Ethical Treatment of Animals, which targets children all the way down to elementary
school with its anti-meat campaigns, claims that 20 percent of college students
are vegetarians. Sixty percent of the nation's schools offered vegetarian
alternatives in 2001, up from 40 percent in 1999, according to the American
School Food Service Association. "Vegetarianism is on the rise, especially
among teens and college-age students," said Patricia Trostle, education
co-ordinator for PETA. "They're forming these ideas and habits that they
are going to have for the rest of their lives. "Nutritionists say vegetarianism
can be perfectly healthy, so long as teens do it the right way.
Many don't.
A University of Minnesota study of more than 4,700 adolescents in the Minneapolis-St.
Paul area found that teen vegetarians were less health-conscious than meat-eaters.
The vegetarians also were more likely to be considering suicide or taking
extreme measures to lose weight, including vomiting and using diet pills and
laxatives.
The National
Cattlemen's Beef Association has picked up on these concerns and others in
its effort to win teens back to meat. The group has launched an education
campaign that equates beef-eating with good self-esteem, called "Cool
to be Real."
The subtle
message: Real girls eat beef. "If there is a whole section of young women
and to a lesser extent men who are reducing their consumption of any particular
food, the industry that provides that food would be keen to reclaim them,"
said Steve Kay, an editor of Cattle Buyers Weekly, a trade publication. Cattlemen
officials recently enlisted a child psychologist, Sylvia Rimm, author of "See
Jane Win," to convey their pro-beef message to editors of magazines and
Web sites that reach teen girls. The editors were sceptical, the beef group
found.
Besides
protein, beef also is a good source of iron and zinc. Sixty percent of adolescent
girls don't get enough iron, and 47 percent don't get enough zinc, U.S. Department
of Agriculture data show. But those aren't the only nutrients that teen girls
often lack - even larger percentages don't get enough calcium and folate.
There are other sources for protein, iron and zinc besides meat. Beans provide
iron and protein. Green leafy vegetables and fortified cereals supply a wide
range of nutrients. "Anytime you eliminate one food or group of foods
from your diet, you run the risk of not meeting your nutrient needs,"
said Keith-Thomas Ayoob, a paediatric nutritionist at New York's Albert Einstein
College of Medicine. "You can have a (vegetarian/vegan) diet that is
extremely healthy, but you can also have one that is inadequate nutritionally."
Erie couple
is suing KFC
Taken
from the Daily Camera.
An Erie
couple has sued KFC restaurants claiming their two small children became infected
with salmonella and one later required surgery after eating popcorn chicken
at a Lafayette restaurant last year.
The chicken
dish was meant to be a treat for Gianni, 1, and Kiley, 2, for their behaviour
during a Jan. 6, 2002, trip to a local mall, according to a lawsuit filed
Friday in Boulder District Court.
Three days
after eating the chicken, Gianni was hospitalised at a Louisville hospital.
Two months after visiting the Lafayette KFC at 255 South Boulder Road, surgeons
operated on the boy to repair an umbilical and epigastric hernia that was
brought on by the infection, the suit claims. "I'm furious with KFC,"
Gianni's mother, Natalie Velotta, said Monday. "I will never go back
to that restaurant again. I don't even want their commercials in my house."
Kiley also
suffered from vomiting and severe diarrhoea, but her condition did not escalate
like Gianni's. Natalie and her husband, Jamey, seek damages under the Colorado
Product Liability Act for future and past medical expenses, emotional distress
and loss of enjoyment of life.
The couple's
attorney, William Marler of Seattle said the Lafayette restaurant didn't take
the necessary steps to ensure its customers were served unadulterated food.
As a result, "these children became the innocent victims of KFC's negligence,"
Marler said. A spokesperson with KFCUSA Inc. in Louisville, Kentucky, said
she had not seen the lawsuit so she could not address it specifically.
Amy Sherwood
did say, however, "the health and safety of our customers is our top
priority. We have strict food safety and handling guidelines." On Jan.
18, 2002, Boulder County Health Department inspectors found two areas in the
restaurant of potential cross contamination - in the water used to wet chicken
pieces before battering and in the flour mixture used for the meat's batter,
the document stated. A later test showed that Gianni and another child were
infected with the same strain of bacteria: salmonella Newport. A test conducted
by state inspectors showed that the bacteria had the same genetic fingerprint.
"I'm really, really hurt for everything that happened to Gianni,"
Natalie Velotta said. "The worst part to me is how it affected him psychologically.
It's the worst thing I've ever been through."
Primate
research on trial
Key public
inquiry into proposed monkey labs starts this month. Scientific research on
primates goes on trial later this month during a public inquiry at which Cambridge
University will seek to overturn the local authority¹s decision to refuse
it permission to build a massive new brain research centre on the outskirts
of the city.
Hundreds
of monkeys every year would have their brains deliberately damaged in an attempt
to simulate the symptoms of Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, drug addiction, depression
and other such conditions. The University will be arguing that the project
must go ahead on Green Belt land because it is in the national
interest.
It is
backed by biotech business mogul and Science Minister Lord Sainsbury, as well
as by the Prime Minister himself. The UK's leading anti-vivisection groups
will be at the inquiry to argue that the primate model of these specifically
human neurological conditions produces nothing of use to human medicine.
The experiments
also cause extreme suffering to the animals. Cambridge researchers have already
carried out such 'procedures' in existing university lab facilities and have
published descriptions in scientific journals.
Those
reports show that the animals suffer a range of appalling post-operative symptoms
including seizures, vomiting, diarrhoea, tremors and bleeding from head wounds.
Detailed evidence will be submitted jointly by Animal Aid and the National
Anti-Vivisection Society supported by Naturewatch, PeTA, Uncaged and
local group, X-Cape (Cambridge Against Primate Experiments).
Oral
evidence for the groups will be presented by Dr Ray Greek M.D., author of
two key ground-breaking volumes setting out the scientific case against the
animal model.
The inquiry,
which is expected to last for seven days, will serve as a key battleground
over the future of primate experiments in the UK. The independence of the
planning process is also on trial, as a result of the conspicuous prior interventions
by Tony Blair and Lord Sainsbury and because deputy Prime Minister,
John Prescott, has announced that the final decision as to whether the centre
goes ahead will be his rather than that of the inspector presiding over the
inquiry.
Animal
Aid director, Andrew Tyler, and National Anti-Vivisection Society director,
Jan Creamer, said in a joint statement: Mutilating monkeys will not help in
the treatment of people. Alzheimer¹s, for instance, is a dementia, characterised
by loss of intellectual powers notably the powers of language and organised
abstract thought.
How do
we recognise, let alone measure such things in a marmoset? The university
wants to build the facility because animal experiments have become a long-standing
habit; also because of intellectual arrogance, together with the prestige
that comes from doing important research that gets published in specialist
journals.
A third
reason is money - in the form of lucrative research grants (often paid from
taxes) plus collaborations with drug and biotech companies whose main objective
is profits. We urge the University to dedicate its intellectual and financial
resources to building a world-class Centre of Excellence.
Here,
human neurological diseases can be studied using state-of-the-art non-animal
technologies, such as computer modelling, cell and tissue cultures, non-invasive
brain imaging and clinical observation. A primate lab will not, in any case,
have a long-term future. Growing public opposition means that the government
will find it increasingly difficult to approve the use of these animals. More
information: Andrew Tyler at Animal Aid; Sacha Bond at NAVS (tel. 020 8563
0250),and from X-CAPE (tel 01223 311828).
For full
background, see www.x-cape.org.uk,
www.animalaid.org uk, www.navs.org.uk.
Dr Ray Greek has co-authored, with Dr Jean Greek, Sacred Cows and Golden Geese
(Continuum, 2000) and Specious Science (Continuum, 2002). Both available from
Animal Aid.
U.S.
warns Eli Lilly animal unit on reporting
Eli Lilly
and Co.'s animal health unit did not promptly submit some reports of adverse
events in pigs given the drug Paylean, a feed additive used to boost the animals'
weight, U.S. regulators said in a letter released on Tuesday.
The reports
included complaints of stiffness and vomiting in pigs given Paylean, according
to a Sept. 12 warning letter from the Food and Drug Administration. "Your
firm failed to submit a number of unexpected adverse drug experience reports
and information concerning any unusual failure of the drug to exhibit its
expected pharmacological activities" within the required 15 days, the
letter said.
The FDA
also said the company did not supply data from two tissue residue studies
to the agency, as required, before it received approval for Paylean. Paylean
is the trade name for ractopamine hydrochloride, a product that causes the
hog's metabolism to shift nutrients from fat to muscle growth.
Researchers
last year credited Paylean with helpingto boost the average weight of pigs
to a record level." We don't think (the letter) calls into question the
safety and efficacy (of Lilly products)," Rob Smith, a spokesman for
Lilly, said. He said the company has put new measures in place to address
the FDA's concerns and efforts to satisfy regulators should not have a material
financial impact on the company.
The warning
letter was posted on the FDA Website on Tuesday. Most issues raised in warning
letters are resolved without further action, but they can lead to further
steps such as product seizures.
Animal
cruelty, violent abuse: conference explores link
Some
agencies that work with victims of violence are gearing up for an unusual
conference in Kingston this month to explore the connection between cruelty
to animals and human violence.
Child
and animal welfare workers in Kingston hope the conference will help bring
about changes to their investigations. Experts from Canada and the U.S. will
present at the conference.
One of
the presentations will be made by an researchers from Guelph, Ontario, who
spent a year studying more than 20cases of violence. Child welfare advocates
worked with the city's humane society to see if animal cruelty in a home signalled
violence against people.
The researchers
found that, in many of the cases, it did. Mary Zilney, who headed up the project,
says potential abuse cases in the area are now investigated differently. "You
find out lots about what's going on in the family by looking at the condition
of the animal," said Zilney. "It also sometimes gives you a clue
as to what's going on in the family by looking at kids who are rough on animals."
Child
and animal welfare workers in Kingston hope the conference will help bring
about changes to their investigations. Erin Merry, with the Children's Aid
Society, wants to see case workers pose questions around animal cruelty. "They
can go into the home and specifically ask, 'Has the child been abusive to
any of the pets or animals?' And then, that way we could target more of the
behaviours," said Merry. A researcher from Washington, D.C., will also
be at the conference making a link between animal abuse and some serial crimes.
Lack
of evidence to support House of Lords report
Pandora
Pound, Research Fellow University of Bristol, Department of Social Medicine,
Canynge Hall, Whiteladies Road, Bristol BS8 2PR, Pandora Pound and Shah Ebrahim. Email Pandora Pound, et al.: Pandora.Pound@bristol.ac.uk
As you
note(1), the House of Lords Select Committee on Animals in Scientific Procedures
concluded that animal experiments were necessary, but that more needs to be
done to develop and promote alternative methods. While it is clear that the
Committee sought the views and opinions of a wide range of experts, we were
struck throughout by the lack of published, peer reviewed evidence to support
one of the important conclusions that they drew: 'On balance, we are convinced
that experiments on animals have contributed greatly to scientific advances, both for human medicine and for animal health.
Animal experimentation is a valuable research method which has proved itself
over time.' (Page 22, para 4.8.)
We are
not suggesting that the Lords did not seek out such evidence (it is clear
from the transcripts published on the Internet that on many occasions they
asked witnesses to supply them with peer reviewed references and reviews to
support their claims about the efficacy of animal experiments); rather, we
wish to draw attention to the poverty and paucity of this evidence. There
are hardly any systematic reviews, meta- analyses or retrospective, historical evaluations
which can be drawn upon to either support or refute the practice of using
animals as models of human disease.
The Lords'
assertion of the value of animal experimentation rests on the increase in
effective human treatments that have arisen at the same time as the expansion
of animal experimentation. This correlation does not mean that animals were
necessary for the development of these treatments.
The move
within medicine to become more 'evidence based' needs to be replicated in
research. In other words, if there is uncertainty about a particular paradigm
or methodology - in this case the efficacy of using animals as models of human
disease - evidence needs to be gathered so that claims about its efficacy
can be supported or refuted. If there is no evidence to support the use of
a particular methodology and only custom and practice sustain it, then that methodology
should be discarded. At present we are in the ridiculous situation whereby
animal tests are used as the gold standard by which so called 'alternatives'
are judged, yet there is virtually no evidence to support the use of the animal
tests themselves. In the few cases where systematic reviews of animal experiments
have been conducted (2,3)serious doubts have been raised about the methodologies
used.
Evaluating
the practice of using animals as models of human disease is fairly straightforward
and practicable where established animal models of diseases exist (4,5). The
models should be evaluated retrospectively, the key criterion being the productivity
of the animal model in terms of producing treatments for humans. Dr Pandora
Pound Professor Shah Ebrahim
References
1. Dobson, R. Lords support animal experiments but call for alternatives.
British Medical Journal 2002; 325: 238.
2. Horn
J, De Haan RJ, Vermeulen M, Luiten PG, Limburg M. Nimodipine in animal model
experiments of focal cerebral ischemia: a systematic review. Stroke 2001;
32 (10): 2433-8.
3. Roberts
I, Kwan I, Evans P, Haig S. Does animal experimentation inform human health
care? Observations from a systematic review of international animal experiments
on fluid resuscitation. British Medical Journal 2002; 324: 474-476.
4. Shapiro
KJ. Animal models of human psychology. 1998, Hogrefe and Huber Publishers,
Seattle.
5. Kaufman
SR et al. An evaluation of ten randomly-chosen animal models of human disease.
Perspectives on animal research. 1989; 1: Whole Supplement. Original Article:
http://bmj.com/cgi/content/full/325/7358/238.
Biotech
minister made GM millions
The
following article was taken from the Mail On Sunday.
Government
Minister has made about £20m on GM food shares - while having official
responsibility for regulating the 'Frankenstein food' technology.
Lord
Sainsbury's shares in a leading biotech investment company, Innotech, have
risen from £26.9m in 1998 when he became Minister for Science and Innovation
to £42.6m today.
The billionaire
peer, who also owns fast-rising shares in another company with interests in
GM food, has donated £9m to the Labour Party, nearly half of it since
assuming office. He has
said he always 'stands aside' if a conflict of interests arises, but Green
campaigners reacted with fury to the revelations. Charles Secrett, director
of Friends of the Earth, said: 'This is an outrageous conflict of interests. He is responsible for a key policy area and has been making millions
as a result of those policies.'
The GM
food issue is anathema to environmentalists but the Government is receptive
to the technology. Last week Tony Blair condemned those who sabotaged GM crops
and called for an 'informed debate'. But Lord Sainsbury's profits will create
a new talking point.
A Government
spokesman said that Lord Sainsbury avoided any conflicts of interests and
his investments were run by a blind trust. 'He has no knowledge over the assets
in the trust which is independently administered
on his behalf,' he said.
Case for shutting
laboratory door
The
following article was taken from the New Zealand Herald.
As the
Greens make a stand over GM, scientists debate whether their most radical
advances help or threaten society. Science reporter Simon Collins reports.
In January last year, Australian scientist Dr Bob Seamark issued "a worldwide
warning". His team at the Canberra-based Co-operative Research Centre
for the Biological Control of Pest Animals had accidentally created a mousepox
virus that killed all the mice in his laboratory within days.
The mousepox
itself was no danger to humans. But the technique used to create it could
be applied to the human disease of smallpox, which Seamark warned would be
deadly in the hands of terrorists. Sixteen months later, after the still-unsolved
anthrax attacks in the United States late last year, no one doubts the real
threat of biological terrorism.
Other
threats from fast-advancing technology may be just as real. Two years ago,
Sun Microsystems co-founder Bill Joy warned the world against three growing
dangers - genetically modified organisms, new organisms created from molecules
by "nano- technology", and even robots which might soon be able
to reproduce themselves.
In the
past week New Zealanders have been unexpectedly forced to confront the first
issue by the Greens' GM ultimatum to Labour. And tonight Auckland University's
Liggins Institute has invited Seamark and Auckland biologist DR Peter Wills
to hear Joy on video and then debate the question, "Will technology destroy
society as we know it?"
Joy,
who sees a clear risk that it will, wrote: "The only realistic alternative
I can see is relinquishment: to limit development of the technologies that
are too dangerous, by limiting our pursuit of certain kinds of knowledge."
Wills, who gave evidence for the Green Party to the Royal Commission on Genetic
Modification, agrees. He says the Greens are right to stand out against releasing
genetically modified organisms into the environment, even though that stand
threatens to bring down the next government.
Tonight's
debate could provide an interesting clash of views. When Seamark issued his
"worldwide warning" about mice and smallpox, Wills sent him an angry
email condemning him for playing around with genetically modified organisms
(GMOs) in the first place. "You clearly had no idea of the potential
outcomes, but you cloned a transgene with multiple functions into an active,
pathological vector," Wills wrote, "You
hide behind the charade of official regulation as if it gives some reasonable
means of protecting the world from the consequences of your bringing to reality
our pathetically inadequate vision of how biological cells operate. We do
not need your 'products'. Have the courage now to bring all of such projects
under your control to a halt."
Seamark
emailed back his "thanks for expressing your views so cogently. On this
issue we clearly disagree," he wrote. "I do, however, have continuing
respect for your public advocacy for your viewpoint on GMOs and trust that
we both retain a capacity to listen objectively to the full range of viewpoints."
Seamark told journalists at the time that the mousepox was developed "for
completely humanitarian motives". "Our aim is to counter the enormous
damage and human suffering which rodents cause by devouring a major part of
the global grain harvest, especially in developing countries and in Australia,"
he said.
But Joy's
main concern with genetic modification is that "it gives the power -
whether militarily, accidentally or in a deliberate terrorist act - to create
a White Plague". Even without Seamark's lethal twist, the world is highly
vulnerable to any release of smallpox because it is widely assumed to have
been eliminated and people are no longer vaccinated against it. Other critics,
such as the Washington-based Turning Point Project, warn that it is a short
step from testing foetuses for genetic defects to selectively breeding babies
to be more intelligent, strong or good-looking. "Nanotechnology"
holds potentially even greater threats, as well as huge promise. It is the
technology of making things that are only nanometres - billionths of a metre-wide,
the size of individual molecules.
At this
scale, scientists and engineers can change things that have to be taken for
granted on larger scales. This may make possible lighter and stronger materials,
faster computers, "smart concrete" that will detect signs of weakness
and release chemicals to combat it, and medical implants that will attract
raw materials out of bodily fluids and use them to rebuild bone or skin.
Even
though the technology is in its infancy, Governments in the developed world
are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on it. US venture capitalists
sank US$100 million ($211 million) into nanotech-related start-ups last year.
In New
Zealand, the MacDiarmid Institute for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology
is one of five centres of research excellence which will share $60 million
of state funding in the next four years.
One of
the institute's principal investigators, DRSteve Durbin of Canterbury University,
says it is looking for cheaper materials and fabrication techniques, including
alternative methods of transferring patterns on to computer chips. "There
is quite a lot that we don't understand. The closer we look, the more questions
we ask," he says.
But Joy
worries that new kinds of bacteria created by nanotechnology could reproduce
exponentially and reduce the whole natural environment to dust "in a
matter of days". This prospect of marauding gooey bacteria has become
known as the "grey goo problem" - a threat to life as we know it.
More surprisingly, Joy sees even robots as a potential threat as they become
more intelligent than people.
That
may happen sooner than we think. It is already five years since an IBM computer
named Deep Blue beat chess champion Garry Kasparov. Massey University Professor
Bob Hodgson told engineers in Wellington in March that by 2020 the typical
$1000 computer will exceed the computing power of the human brain.
Within
a few more decades, he predicted, that typical computer will exceed the computing
power of all human brains combined. "Machines will claim to be conscious,
and that claim will be accepted," he said. "All sorts of things
are possible, including a symbiosis between silicon and the organic. It's
very likely that some hybrids will develop. This is going to raise a lot of
issues if we have hybrids that are partly human, for example, the brains of
brain-damaged people."
Seamark,
on the phone this week from Adelaide, where he now heads the Flinders Medical
Research Institute, said his mousepox virus was being "refined"
to achieve its original goal of preventing the mice from reproducing rather
than killing them on the spot. "It's up to the technologists to make
a compelling case that it could be used safely." There are precedents.
Myxomatosis was introduced in Australia 50 years ago to kill rabbits. Rabbit
calicivirus disease (RCD) was introduced there in the late 1980s and brought
to New Zealand illegally in 1997 by farmers desperate to control rabbits.
Mousepox
in its accidentally lethal form could be introduced in the same way. "RCD
kills rabbits humanely. They don't appear to suffer. They just become listless
and sit down and die quite quietly," Seamark said. "If mousepox
kills the mice fairly effectively, but arguably in a humane way, it could
be released. But we'd still prefer to have full control over the process so
we could make that determination exactly. We wanted it as an agent which sterilises
so we could use it as a preventive agent rather than a killing agent."
Seamark
is a biotech pioneer. At Adelaide University in 1970, his laboratory was the
world's third to make frozen human semen available for in vitro fertilisation.
Later he was the first to insert foreign genes into pigs, sheep, cattle and
fish. Later still, he cloned sheep and cattle. He says technologists should
not be blamed for what is really society's failure to deal with problems such
as food production and pest control in other ways. When he realised the terrorist
potential of the techniques he used with mousepox, he urged the world to strengthen
the 30-year-old Biological Weapons Convention. He believes this may now happen
after last year's anthrax scare. "In the long term the only resolution
of this will be better distribution of educational opportunities and resources
around the world so we don't disenfranchise a lot of human beings and give
them a reason for wanting to go off and destroy 'evil empires'."
Another
scientist at the MacDiarmid Institute, Otago University chemistry lecturer
DR Kate McGrath, says humanity should not give up the potential benefits of
genetic modification, nanotechnology or robotics just because some people
might use that knowledge for evil ends.
She opposes
cloning animals - for ethical reasons, not because of any risk to the environment.
"I do not approve of cloning animals because I associate with them some
semblance of identity," she says. But it is a difficult line to draw.
"Where you decide that a cell is a cell, and not an animal or a human
or whatever, is an issue that is being debated around the world."
But Wills
says he would, like the Greens, prefer to keep genetic modification "inside
the laboratory" because any attempt to modify an organism is liable to
have the kind of unintended effects that Seamark found with his mice. Like
Seamark, Wills has spent years in the field. But he specialised in researching
"prions", the biological agents that produce brain disorders such
as mad cow disease. He has learned that the biological systems in humans and
other animals are intensely complex, and there is "no simple one-to-one
relationship between genes and biological traits. Our lack of knowledge and
understanding of the diffuse, intertwined processes of self-organisation on
which all of life depends creates an overriding uncertainty in analyses of
the consequences of genetic manipulation," he has written.
He is
willing to see genetically engineered medicines such as insulin created inside
the laboratory, as long as the organisms that created them are not released.
But the best potential safeguard he can see would be for scientists to refuse
to practise their science for "partisan ends" - whether military
or commercial. "Today the Prime Minister sounded off at the Green Party,"
he said on Monday. "It's a clash of values between those who want to
commercialise the changing of organisms at the genetic level, and those who
see that as a bad way to organise the next hundreds or thousands of years
of human stewardship of the biosphere. "Most of the partisan ends that
scientists are working for now are global political interests, so this is
a highly political question - what science should be controlled for, what
is the common good. That is what we have democracy for. The only way we are
going to get control of this stuff is if we really have participatory democracy."
UK
Group Blasts Cambridge Over Monkey Experiments
The
following article was taken from The Reuters News Agency.
A British
anti-vivisection group said on Friday it had uncovered "horrific"
experiments being carried out on hundreds of monkeys at Cambridge University
as part of medical research into brain diseases.
The British
Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV) said some monkeys died following
the experiments or had to be put down. Others suffered bleeding head wounds,
fits, vomiting, severe bruising, body tremors, mental and physical disabilities.
A Cambridge
spokesman said the university was taking the matter extremely seriously and
had launched a full-scale investigation into the allegations.
BUAV
said in a statement that hundreds of marmoset monkeys underwent surgery in
which their skulls were cut open, muscle scraped away and an area of the brain
deliberately damaged. "The BUAV...expose throws the spotlight of public
scrutiny on one of the most secret areas of animal experimentation at what
is claimed to be a flagship laboratory," BUAV chief executive Michelle
Thew said.
The Cambridge
spokesman said the university rigidly enforced government protocols for the
use of animals in medical research experiments and carried out its work in
consultation with government inspectors and under license. "These claims
have very far-reaching implications and every possible effort is being made
to establish the facts surrounding them," the Cambridge spokesman said
in a statement.
BUAV
said the Home Office had underestimated the level of suffering when issuing
licenses for the experiments and had failed to review the licenses once the
project, which involves research into Parkinson's Disease and strokes, was
under way.
BUAV
said one of its investigators spent 10 months making secret undercover films
of experiments being performed on
Cloning
for transplant may produce fatal genetic imbalances
The
following article was taken from The
Independent Newspaper on May 27 2002.
Plans
to clone human embryos to generate vital stem cells for transplant operations
are likely to fail using the techniques currently available, a study has found.
Scientists
at the University of Connecticut have discovered that cloning produces genetic
imbalances, which could explain why so many cloned animals are stillborn or
suffer from medical problems after birth and die prematurely. The same flaws
could also jeopardise the use of stem cells derived from cloned human embryos
produced for "therapeutic" purposes. The resulting tissues would
be too defective to repair damaged organs, the scientists said.
"Currently,
cloning technology is immature and shouldn't be expanded out to humans,"
said Cindy Tian, assistant professor of developmental biology. "It's
bad news at the moment for therapeutic cloning but it's good news in that
we're realising what needs to be overcome," she said.
The study,
published in the journal Nature Genetics, examined 10 genes on the X chromosomes
of 10 cloned female calves, six of which had died either in the womb or soon
after birth.
They
looked at a process called X-chromosome inactivation. This normally results
in one of the two X chromosomes of females being switched off so that the
cells of females have the same number of genes switched on as males, who have
only one X chromosome.
The scientists
found that nine out of 10 genes for the dead clones were abnormal in the way
they were activated, or "expressed". They also found that this pattern
of activation differed from one cloned animal to another, indicating the random
nature of the process.
There
were no such abnormalities in gene activation in the clones that had lived
and in female calves resulting from normal sexual reproduction.
During
normal animal development only the X chromosome inherited from the mother
is activated in the placenta, but the study showed that both X chromosomes
were active in the placentas of the dead cows. This might explain why the
placentas of cloned animals are often bigger than normal and why some cloned
foetuses are abnormally large.
Jerry
Yang, who led the Connecticut team, said the work could explain why some 80
per cent of cloned animals died during pregnancy or soon after birth.
'Hunt
hijack' at RSPCA elections
The
following article was taken from The Times newspaper on 25 May 2002.
Members
of the RSPCA, the world’s oldest animal welfare charity, were warned
yesterday that extremists had infiltrated next week’s elections to the
ruling council. The hardliners identified in a letter from the charity leadership
are supporters of fox-hunting with hounds, not animal rights activists engaged
in direct action against vivisection laboratories. The RSPCA opposed hunting
in 1996.
The move
undermines the Queen’s role as patron as she is a supporter of blood
sports. Malcolm Tomlinson, chairman of the RSPCA council, has sent a harsh
letter to the 44,000 members warning that the elections could be hijacked.
His letter stated: “The society is always at risk of infiltration from
people who may not have the best interests of animal welfare or the RSPCA
at heart. I suggest that before deciding how to vote, you read carefully the
information given by all the candidates.”
Mr Tomlinson
does not identify the extremists but a telephone call to the members’
advice line made clear exactly who the letter was aimed at. A man on the helpline,
who called himself Stewart, said: “We suspect they support hunting with
hounds and want to overturn our policy on it. The RSPCA is opposed to hunting
and we don’t want candidates securing election to the council who will
try to overturn it. “We
are not allowed to comment on candidates’ manifestos but read them carefully.
Hobbies will be listed where it might say if they hunt.”
The RSPCA
has infuriated leading members such as Sir John Mortimer, the playwright,
who is a keen huntsman. 'We know who they mean by infiltrators,' he said.
'They mean us. They have stolen the soul of the society.'
'Cruel'
Uni Monkey
The
following article was taken from Sky News.
An inquiry
is underway into claims that 'horrific' experiments were carried out on monkeys
at one of Britain's top universities.
Animal
welfare campaigners claim to have video evidence of operations being carried
out on monkeys at Cambridge University.
A member
of the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV) worked as a lab
technician at the university for 10 months, in which time she became "desperately
disturbed" by tests taking place on marmosets.
The experiments
included sawing the tops off the monkeys' skulls, damaging or taking away
parts of their brains and then sewing the head on again.
The animals
were also deprived of water for 22 out of 24 hours to make them work harder
in "task tests" they were forced to perform, said the BUAV.
The undercover
BUAV member collected video footage of the activities in the laboratory. The
university said it is taking the matter "extremely seriously" and
had launched a full scale inquiry into the claims.
The revelations
follow Tony Blair's assertion this week that Britain must push ahead with
scientific research despite public hysteria on issues such as GM food.
Anti-whaling
marches planned
The
following article was taken from the Sunday Telegraph newspaper on May 26
2002.
Hundreds
of people are to walk on a host of routes throughout Britain to raise funds
for an anti-whaling campaign.
The Whale
and Dolphin Conservation Society's Sea Red campaign is intended to raise awareness
over the possibility of a resumption of commercial whaling.
The group
is highlighting the exploitation of smaller sea creatures in Japanese waters
during the International Whaling Commission in Shimonoseki, Japan.
The WDC
said: "600,000 dolphins, porpoises and small whales have been killed
... in addition to the thousands of large whales ... hunted despite the ban
on commercial whaling adopted by the IWC in 1986."
There
will be 66 sponsored walks held at locations all over Britain in the 2002
Walk for Whales and Dolphins. Most will be five miles long but on some 10-mile
walks participants may get the chance to see bottlenose dolphins or harbour
porpoises from the coastline.
The 10-mile
routes are in Devon, Torbay, the Moray Firth in Scotland and Bangor in Wales.
Animal laboratory
'should go ahead'
The
following article was taken from the BBC News website.
Plans
for a controversial new animal research laboratory in Cambridge have received
support from the UK Government's chief scientist. Planning permission for
the laboratory at Girton College on the city outskirts was turned down in
February.
Cambridgeshire
police said the cost of policing animal rights protests would be too high.
But the government's chief scientist David King has stepped in, lending weight
to Cambridge University's appeal against the decision. A decision to refuse
the application would have a deeply damaging effect Professor King said it
would be unacceptable if Cambridge University was unable to build the new
laboratory in the city, though not necessarily at Girton.
South
Cambridgeshire District Council rejected the plans amid concerns that testing
on animals would attract protests like those staged outside the Huntingdon
Life Sciences.
A spokesman
said it could not guarantee public safety or afford the cost of policing protests
at the laboratory, which would use monkeys for testing. Last year, Cambridgeshire
police spent £2m policing animal rights demonstrations.
Professor
King told the BBC that funding would be found for a new laboratory in Cambridge
researching neural diseases.
In a
statement, the university said: "It's good to know that the government
supports so strongly the work scientists are doing to ease human suffering.
The university remains convinced that this project is vital, and the best
site is Huntingdon road.
A decision
to refuse the application would have a deeply damaging effect on the ongoing
search for alleviation of life-threatening diseases, and potentially on the
pharmaceutical industry of this country." In
February the council's decision to block the plan was described by the university
as "deeply damaging". A spokeswoman said research into such conditions
as Alzheimer's, autism and Parkinson's disease would be set back because of
the authority's decision.
Professor
David King was Master of Downing College, Cambridge, and head of the university's
chemistry department when he was brought in by Tony Blair to advise the government
on the big scientific issues of the day.
Put
your money where your mouth is, Blair
(SHAC)
has joined qualified members of the scientific community in challenging the
Prime Minister to a public debate on the scientific validity of animal research,
and specifically the practices of Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS). Both the
activists and scientists demand Blair defend his position that HLS's work
is scientific.
Today
Prime Minister Blair will speak to the House of Commons attacking anti-vivisection
and anti-GMO activists as unscientific. Blair's speech, the culmination of
numerous similar statements in the recent press, is expected to be particularly
abrasive.
Activists
reiterate that they are not against scientific progress, but instead oppose
the disgraceful practices of HLS and the gross misconception that animal research
is scientifically sound.
Stop
Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC) and Europeans For Medical Advancement
(EFMA), a coalition of scientists and medical professionals opposed to animal
research on scientific grounds, challenge Tony Blair to put his money where
his mouth is. SHAC and EFMA have offered to provide a scientist(s) to publicly
debate a comparable individual(s) on the supposed benefits of animal testing
and that of of HLS.
"If
Blair is so confident in his beliefs, he should have no qualms about backing
them up with credentials and sound, scientific argument," states SHAC
spokesperson Joseph Dawson. "For the Prime Minister to include HLS--which
has been exposed falsifying research reports, taking inaccurate readings,
and breaching hundreds of Good Laboratory Practice guidelines--into a category
of those contributing to scientific advancement is extremely worrisome."
Campaigners
will attempt to present their challenge personally to Tony Blair at various
points throughout the day. For further information / comment please contact
SHAC on 0845 458 0630
Animal
rights, environmental groups face off over animal lab testing
Animal-rights
activists have accused several leading environmental groups of insensitivity
and cruelty to animals because they support federal efforts to test the toxic
effects of thousands of industrial chemicals and pesticides on laboratory
animals.
The bitter
feud involves three Environmental Protection Agency chemical-testing programs
created in large part because of pressure from environmental groups. Environmentalists
complain that the government knows relatively little about the safety of tens
of thousands of manmade chemicals that are polluting the environment and possibly
damaging the health of people and wildlife.
Animal-rights
proponents, who might otherwise be regarded as natural allies to environmentalists,
are passionately opposed to the testing programs, claiming they will result
in the needless suffering and deaths of millions of lab animals.
They
have joined the pesticide industry in court in trying to block one testing
program from going forward and have threatened to sue the EPA over a second
testing program.
One group,
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), has launched a Web site,
www.meangreenies.com,
attacking three well-known environmental groups - the Natural Resources Defense
Council, the World Wildlife Fund and Environmental Defense - for backing the
use of lab animals.
PETA
also took out newspaper ads in San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, D.C.,
asking donors to the three groups to switch their contributions to organizations
that oppose animal testing. "We've tried to discuss what we think are
critical issues with these environmental groups and have had obstacles erected
at every turn in our effort to reduce the amount of animal suffering that
these programs stand for,'' said Jessica Sadler, federal liaison for PETA.
"The fact is that EPA kills more animals in chemical toxicity tests than
any other federal agency and they still have not banned a single toxic industrial
chemical in more than a decade,'' Sadler said.
Environmentalists
say they support using non-animal tests where possible, but that some lab
animals may have to be sacrificed in order to reduce or eliminate the use
of dangerous chemicals. "Although there are certain moral qualms about
animal testing, some people argue that those moral qualms are outweighed by
the need to come to some conclusion about the impacts that are happening to
people and animals out in the real world that we haven't even been studying
until now,'' said Dr. Ted Schettler of the Science and Environmental Health
Network, a scientific think tank for the environmental movement.
Animal-rights
activists contend that most animal tests could be eliminated by substituting
computer modeling and test-tube methods or through greater scrutiny of existing
scientific data. Federal regulators, industry scientists and environmentalists
disagree. "The state of the science at present is that most of these
studies are done using animals," said Charles Auer, director of EPA's
chemical control division. "In general, there is not an acceptable alternative
to the animal test at present. This is a view that is held not just in the
United States, but in Europe and elsewhere.''
The largest
of the three programs is EPA's Endocrine Disruptor Screening Program, which
is scheduled to begin next year. The program was authorized by Congress in
1996 but has been bogged down by scientific uncertainties and disputes between
the chemical industry and environmentalists over how tests should be conducted.
The program
is the first major government effort to determine which chemicals in commercial
use can disrupt the body's hormones and the glands that produce them, particularly
in the developing fetus.
Studies
have found that certain chemicals, even at very low levels of exposure, can
hinder the proper development of male sex organs and interfere with normal
sexual development. Disturbing human health trends that some scientists believe
may be connected to hormone-disrupting chemicals include increases in breast
and testicular cancer, increases in birth defects in the reproductive organs
of male infants, dramatic declines in sperm counts among men in industrialized
countries, earlier puberty in girls and increases in developmental disorders.
There
are 88,000 chemicals that have been introduced into the environment since
the rise of the petrochemical industry after World War II, although only 2,800
are produced in volumes of more than 1 million pounds per year. Virtually
none have been tested for their hormone-disrupting potential to the degree
proposed under the EPA program.
Many
of the tests used in the program won't require animals, but some chemicals
- no one knows how many probably will be tested using animals. Animals-rights
proponents estimate that between 600,000 and 1.2 million laboratory animals,
mostly rats and mice, will be killed for every 1,000 chemicals tested under
the endocrine-disruptor program. Environmentalists say those estimates are
exaggerated. "I think those numbers are ridiculous,'' said Gina Solomon,
a senior scientist with the Natural Resources Defense Council. "Most
chemicals will be pre-screened out and won't even be tested in animals. Only
a relatively small number of chemicals will test positive. Those will be the
ones that will require a large number of animal tests.''
The controversy
is not limited to the United States. Last year, animal-rights activists -
including the Royal Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and PETA
- launched a campaign protesting European Commission plans to test the safety
of thousands of industrial chemicals, saying it would mean millions of new
animal experiments.
This
month, Germany became the first European Union country to constitutionally
guarantee animal rights, which could curtail animal testing. Ten years ago,
Switzerland passed a constitutional amendment recognizing animals as beings
and not things. Both sides have accused each other of playing into the hands
of the chemical industry. "The only organizations that will win if PETA
succeeds in paralyzing EPA toxicology programs are the major chemical and
pesticide companies,'' the Natural Resources Defense Council said in a recent
letter to its members. "These companies would be quite happy not to have
to pay to have their chemicals tested; they would be pleased not to have to
deal with scientific studies that show that their chemicals may cause cancer,
reproductive harm, neurological damage or endocrine disruption,'' the letter
said.
Animal-rights
proponents, however, said chemical manufacturers are happy to cite animal
studies that support the safety of particular chemicals even while they challenge
the validity of other animal studies whose results raise doubts about chemical
safety. "Animal tests are so unreliable and so subject to manipulation
that industry can go into court, as they do every day, and argue that the
results of the animal tests are not applicable to humans,'' Sadler said. "Every
method for evaluating effects has its limitations,'' responded Steve Russell,
an attorney for the American Chemistry Council, which represents chemical
manufacturers. "We, of course, will point out the limits to any method,
but we do that both for animal and non-animal methods.''