PETA Global Issue 3

P U T T I N G V I V I S E C T I O N U N D E R T H E M I C R O S C O P E

The Heartbreak of Alzheimer’s Disease – and Hope in a Dish

Couple: © iStock.com/Juanmonino | Mouse: © iStock.com/tiripero

A s an internist at a bustling medical center, I know how devastating a dementia diagnosis can be, but I was reminded again when my colleague tearfully told me her story. Her mother no longer recognized her. In fact, her mother no longer even knew where she was: She’d pick up her purse, beg to go home, and then panic when she was told that she already was home. Every night, she pleaded to see her parents, who were both dead, and she struggled with the simplest of tasks. Now, she’d become bed-ridden and could no longer speak. And there was something else: My colleague had requested medication to help alleviate her mother’s constant panic, but the neurologist accused her of wanting to drug her mother and made her feel ashamed for even asking. Scenes like this play out all around the globe, because the medical community has little hope or relief to offer victims of Alzheimer’s disease and their heartbroken families. experiments on animals? I think so. Animals don’t actually get Alzheimer’s disease, but for decades, experimenters have been developing “animal models” of the condition in mice, monkeys, rabbits, dogs, and other nonhuman animals – meaning that studies focus on the wrong disease in the wrong species. Mice are not simply tiny, furry humans. This is why there have been no new therapies for Alzheimer’s in 10 years – and 99.6% of drugs that seemed to be successful in experiments on animals have failed in humans, leading Inside Science to call Alzheimer’s research “a graveyard for expensive drug tests.” A Doctor’s Perspective Would we be closer to a treatment or a cure today if we hadn’t squandered our time and resources conducting

Animal Experiments Don’t Work The US government acknowledges that animals are not good experimental models for humans, yet it spends $12 billion per year on new animal experiments.

Up to 89% of the results from all animal experiments can’t be reproduced, wasting $28billion per year.

Drugs that appear safe in animal trials cause the deaths of 197,000 humans annually in the EU and more than 120,000 in the US.

95% of new pharmaceutical drugs that test safe and effective in animals fail in human trials.

90% of animal studies fail to lead to treatments for humans.

But there is a way forward: As animal studies fail, forward-thinking scientists and policymakers are looking for new solutions. One of these is “Alzheimer’s in-a-dish,” developed by Harvard Medical School researchers who grew human neurons in a three dimensional culture and then introduced genetic traits associated with the disease. Dr. Rudolph Tanzi, who helped develop the technology, predicts that it will “revolutionize drug discovery,” allowing scientists to “screen hundreds of thousands of drugs in a matter of months without using animals.” By contrast, testing a drug in mice takes more than a year.

a laboratory – we must embrace innovative, human relevant technology. Before you donate to a health charity, ask if it funds or conducts experiments on animals. If the answer is yes, don’t write that check.

Dr. Patrice Green is an internist who has practiced all over the US. She has taught and mentored students and residents, emphasizing ethics in

medicine. Currently, she works as a hospitalist on Maryland’s Eastern Shore.

If we are to spare humans the heartbreak of Alzheimer’s disease – and animals the misery of life and death in

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HEADING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION