A MUCH NEEDED VIDEO! I am a biomedical scientist and been working in labs that do test on animals over a decade. Most of these experiments are flawed by design, biased, and definitely not translatable to humans. The problem is people expect the alternatives to animal testing to be perfect, while animal testing is far from being perfect. Results from animal testing are rarely reproducible, and often wrong. They never represent the genetic diversity of human population in an uncontrolled environment. For instance, lab mice are generally genetically homogeneous. Diseases in these animals are generally forcefully induced, so they often don't represent the same biology in humans at all! We must fund and advocate for alternatives. If we did that 100 years ago, we would have been independent from animal testing by now! In less than 100 years we went from inventing cars to landing on the moon! Yet we've been testing on animals all along! This must change, for the sake of human safety and animals' welfare. Btw nice touch on animal welfare act. It's a JOKE! I reviewed organs on chips here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ek3UXUUZkXI&feature=youtu.be
Currently animal testing is incredibly nessicary for the development of many life saving drugs all the way from covid vaccines to drugs to help treat and cure rare life threatening diseases. We are not able to just stop testing but eventually my hope is we will find a way to lessen the impact it has. This is coming from someone in field. Also scientists working on these tests are already constantly trying to find ways to replace animal models wherever they can.
Wow, never heard of organ chips. Sounds very promising, along with the computer models. Great video guys!
Seeing the photos in the labs makes my stomach turn. I do animal rescue and rehab, focusing on the little animals-- reptiles, rodents, small birds-- and they have just as much a capacity to feel as we do. Pain, joy, comfort, curiosity, fear, excitement. Thinking about the rabbits I've cared for being put through the hell that is animal testing is just heartbreaking. All of them are equally as valuable and capable of experiencing the emotions the ones I've known have, but they never will- they will only know fear and pain. Humanity does not have the right to choose who is worth sacrificing in the name of our own progress. "The question is not, 'Can they reason?' nor, 'Can they talk?' but 'Can they suffer?'" ― Jeremy Bentham They can reason. They can talk. And they can suffer. You just have to listen.
Just a heads up, China requires that pretty much everything be tested on animals, so if your favorite brand is also sold in China, it’s probably tested on animals. Look up your favorite products to see if they’re cruelty free. We like to think that animal testing for cosmetics and hygiene products is a thing of the past, but it’s not. It’s just much less common than it used to be.
I prioritize decreasing consumption of animal products and banning factory farms over this issue, to be honest. Like, vivisection is horrible but it pales in comparison with the horror houses where millions of cows, pigs, and chickens are tortured…you know? (And I say this as someone who used to cry at work because she was humanely killing animals for science) Thanks for making this video though—I didn’t know about some of these innovations!
I've never heard of organs on chips and I loooooove them, it's amazing that an objet so small can replicate the way a whole organ works. I just have one question, when doing research, the testing happens on different chips that have cells from a lot of humans, or, since it's kind of new research, it's the data still limited?
Thank you Myles for this video! Offers some clarity about animal research. Unfortunately though, it's a bit inaccurate about U.S. regulations. The AWA is one law that protects research animals, but the Health Research Extension Act of 1985 also does too - this one mandates the Public Health Service (PHS) Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals. Species excluded from the AWA have a good chunk of protection under the PHS Policy at NIH.
Your concluding question is based in a false premise. You ask whether we'd be comfortable with a member of our family taking a drug that has only been tested on chips, but that question disregards the fact that clinical trials in humans follow the animal trials before new drugs are approved for general consumption. The approval given after animal/analogue trials only enables human testing to begin, and the results of those human trials determine whether or not a drug can be sold.
I don’t think it’s ok to be hurting any animal wether it is a sheep or a dog we need to stop eating the animals and abusing them who ever is reading this comment please remember these words “Every life is worth saving” -Mishka (Me)
More good stuff. An aside, there is a lot of bipartisan work done in Congress. You don’t tend to hear about it much because a) it is off brand for the parties these days so they don’t talk about it much, and b) stuff without conflict doesn’t sell well in news outlets, so it gets less media attention, and c) a lot of journalism is kinda lazy and just reports on things that the politicians tell them (especially if their is a fight involved).
It’d be nice to imagine a future where one might 3d print entire organs or complex systems as a research medium to replace animal testing. Until then, it seems kinda hard to have an unwavering faith on computer modeling or small tissue on chips to emulate effects on a complete mammal with huge complexity (+89% is crazy tho!) For drugs, it wouldn’t be unreasonable to me to keep animal testing as a secondary step before human trials, as long as the testing was done humanely.
This is a complex ethical issue! Animal studies may be much more ethical than traditional food industry treatment of animals (this goes without saying I guess). One perspective I'd be interested to hear is on the psychological consequences of sacrificing animals on the lab personnel that actually carry it out. Their perspective may differ from that of eg a hunter or a child psychopath that abuse or kill animals. The methods of sacrificing the animals are grim but interesting--I've heard of Mouse Guillotines as one method but I would wager the more common method is some form of gas chamber. Thought provoking stuff! Above the Noise is quickly becoming one of my favorite shows!!
ANIMAL EXPERIMENTS SHOULD BE BANNED AND PROTECTED BY INTERNATIONAL LAW!
What if a drug unexpectedly affects a different organ than the ones tested on chips and what if computer models used output data from tests on tissues and organs to compress larger simulations?
8:57 Yes
This video perfectly explains the exciting changes in drug testing! Even better, scientists are now using human-derived cells, leading to more accurate testing that reflects how drugs interact with our own bodies! The 'organ on a chip' mentioned in the video is a miniaturized system with living human cells, replicating real-life conditions inside us. This is a game-changer for drug development!
poor animals, imagine how that would feel
humans that have 6 senses can't even solve a problem and bring solution, and start killing animals due to stupidity and cruelty
@AboveTheNoise