Sacred Cows and Golden Geese - The Human Costs of Experiments on Animals (2000)

Greek, C. R. , Swingle Greek, J.

Abstract

Roughly fifteen percent of all hospital admissions are caused by adverse medication reactions. And legal drugs, which made their way to the public via animals, kill approximately 100,000 people per year. That is more than all illegal drugs combined and costs the general public over $136 billion in health care expenses (p. 17). .. We were finding, through scientific search, that extrapolating data from animals to human is either misleading, unnecessary, dangerous, or all three (p. 17). .. Commonly attributed to animal experimentation, the development of drugs and technology did not rely on animals (p. 18). .. Once we actually looked up the true origins of advance in the scientific literature, we either found a clinical discovery, serendipity, or some other non-animal based discovery had previously revealed the knowledge, which animal experimenters later 'validated' in animals (p. 19). .. In 1937, people received elixir of sulfanilamide, a new sulfa drug antibiotic dissolved in diethylene glycol, a chemical similar to antifreeze. One hundred and seven people died, most of them children. Scientists administered the medicine to animals and they too died. This single occasion of parity convinced the scientific community that animals should henceforward be used for testing all medications (p. 43). .. In 1938, Congress passed the Food, Drug, and Cosmetics Act, demanding that drug manufacturers provide proof that their medication were safe (p. 44). ... It should be noted that any [research] grant adds money to the university budget. Hence, universities often overlook unethical research (p. 84). .. The relationship between researchers and peer review committees is entirely symbiotic.