Campaigner Benn joins lab protest (From Oxford Mail)
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Campaigner Benn joins lab protest
7:03pm Monday 17th November 2008 in News
Tony Benn with his trademark pipe
Veteran politician Tony Benn today joined animal rights campaigners for a peaceful protest against Oxford University’s new animal experiment laboratory.
The former Labour MP and political campaigner spent 30 minutes talking to members of campaign group Voice for Ethical Research at Oxford (Vero).
Mr Benn, 83, said: “I have always been a believer in animal rights. There is now a lot of strong evidence that animal testing is not necessary, and could be done in a different way.”
The socialist joined animal rights campaigner Sir David Madden outside Nuffield College, in New Road.
Campaigners wore academic dress to highlight the support they claimed to have from within the university, for their call to end the use of animals in medical research at the institution.
A university spokesman said the Biomedical Sciences Building was about research and not pharmaceutical testing, so arguments about testing were irrelevant.
Comments(27)
beetle & wedge
says...
9:13pm Mon 17 Nov 08
Roger2009
says...
10:10pm Mon 17 Nov 08
DanOxford
says...
10:21pm Mon 17 Nov 08
Roger2009
says...
10:36pm Mon 17 Nov 08
In fact vivisectors will use as many different types of animals as it takes to get the desired result.
CatC
says...
2:02am Tue 18 Nov 08
DanOxford wrote:Dan, given that more than 90% of drugs DON'T WORK in 50%-70% of patients taking them, perhaps you can tell us the causal link between experiments on animals and safe/effective treatments for 'humans'?
He's entitled to peacefully protest just as everyone else is- I'd just like them to sign a waiver that relinquishes their right to any medical attention developed through research on animals.
All the drugs are in fact tested on humans, the indisputable fact is that each species is different from every other species at the cellular and molecular level....
further, tiny, tiny genetic variations between individuals of the SAME species make ALL the difference...these variations influence both the individuals response to diseases and how that individual reacts to medicines...
those variations are why some humans get, for example, CF and others dont, it's why more than 90% of drugs DON'T WORK in 50%-70% of patients taking them.
This is why we must stop squandering vital resources experimenting on individuals of different species and instead put those resources into scientific, human-relevant research.
Kevin_Elliott
says...
10:03am Tue 18 Nov 08
Test tubes and computers are used to complement animal methods, but test tubes and computers have no genes at all, and differ totally from humans on the cellular and molecular level. Does this make these items irrelevant in research?
I've just had some major spinal surgery, using some bone fusion and scanning techniques which only came about because of animal testing. The operation has been a complete success, relieving appalling pain. Animal testing works.
BigAlan
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12:41pm Tue 18 Nov 08
seeunexttuesday
says...
6:35pm Tue 18 Nov 08
big al-yes, catc is talking crap!!thats 100% fact.
And as for catc, well you seem to have been fooled by the crappy posters that have been around for ever and will be shown in the streets by protesters for many years
to come.
i do enjoy watching all the protesters with their boards and chants in the cold. but im sure their leather jackets will keep them warm!!!!!!!!!
dapper dan
says...
7:05pm Tue 18 Nov 08
Roger2009
says...
9:33pm Tue 18 Nov 08
BigAlan
says...
9:56pm Tue 18 Nov 08
CatC
says...
2:44am Wed 19 Nov 08
Animal testing doesn't 'work' though, it is a hard fact that due to immeasurable species' differences at the cellular and molecular level it is impossible to scientifically/safel
y apply the results to humans - so they never know Before testing on humans whether any drug will be safe or effective in humans.
In fact Simon Festing himself has admitted that "It is the purpose of the human clinical trials to work out if the medicines are safe and effective.".
You say 'It is possible to breed mice which have the gene which causes CF. Work on these mice has provided genetic therapies which have contributed to raising the lifespan for people with CF from almost nothing to in the mid thirties'
Not sure from where you are getting your information but according to the CF trust re gene therapy 'The next step is to try to develop effective treatment for people with CF'.
Also, see the info of the middle column of this link re the current situation -
www.cfgenetherapy.or
g.uk/genetherapy.htm
You say 'test tubes and computers have no genes at all, and differ totally from humans on the cellular and molecular level.'
Animals differ totally from humans at the cellular and molecular level and I'll briefly explain re genes for you on a separate post.....but test tubes do have human genes if you put human tissue in them - and anyway there are assays far advanced - and computers have information on human genetics if results from humans are input to them.
Re spinal surgery and bone fusion firstly as humans stand upright the longitudinal load on animals' spines is significantly different, and the hard fact is that there are many differences in tissue composition, spine anatomy, physiology and mechanical properties, further the damage to the spines of lab animals is artificially induced - this means that degenerative changes in animals differ significantly from those in humans...
so it IS on humans that any relevant testing/trials take place.
CatC
says...
3:12am Wed 19 Nov 08
'CatC is yet again quoting figues which has no basis, we can all quote figures all day every day, but thay must have a basis in what they mean'
They certainly do have a basis and the figures were quoted by Allen Roses, the then-vice president of genetics at Glaxo in Dec 2003.
Further, although he admitted it to the public it was already well known by the medical profession ie Numbers Needed to Treat (NNT).
According to the BMJ (Dec 2003) it is well known by doctors that it is "usually necessary to treat many patients in order for one to benefit. NNTs under 5 are unusual, whereas NNTs over 20 are common."
It continues "Roses's quote has, however, hit the media like a bombshell. Why is the NHS paying over £7bn ($12bn; 10bn) a year for drugs that don't work?".
Why indeed.
You say 'the limited testing on animals supervised by the Home office with there very tight regulations '
Even those regulations are not enforced though, for example the BUAV have several times had to take legal action against govt to get it to comply, also see the report 'Diaries of Despair' based on leaked documents which Uncaged Campaigns won a legal battle to put in the public domain.
The report catalogues numerous failings including illegal experiments carried out on primates inside Huntingdon Life Sciences - yet govt took no action and instead has consistently tried to block and cover up.
www.xenodiaries.org/
futile.htm
CatC
says...
3:23am Wed 19 Nov 08
'big al-yes, catc is talking crap!!thats 100% fact.'
No, what I'm saying is 100% hard, scientific fact, and I'm quoting a then-vice president of Glaxo, and my information is from scientists against vivisection on scientific grounds, medical and scientific journals etc...
and from vivisectors themselves, what the public is told and what is said behind our backs are two entirely different things - remember that those who have a career from experimenting on animals or promoting them to the public have a vested-interest ie their livelihood.
'And as for catc, well you seem to have been fooled by the crappy posters...'
My information is from scientists against on scientific grounds and vivisectors themselves.
You say 'im sure their leather jackets will keep them warm', however, those against on scientific grounds are not necessarily for animal rights but anyway you seemed to have been fooled by faux-leather!
CatC
says...
3:49am Wed 19 Nov 08
I note your post was to Roger2009, however, you say 'on what basis do you think that research on animals is fraud???'
The reason why it is fraud is that each species is different at the cellular and molecular level, and even tiny, tiny genetic differences between individuals of the same species make ALL the difference.
Think of CF - you'll agree of course that some humans have CF and other humans don't...yet humans have far, far more genes in common, have far, far greater genetic similarity, than do humans and dogs, cats, primates etc...you see, tiny, tiny genetic differences make ALL the difference.
You say 'I would have thought with all the improvements in our health we have now using animals is not fraud?'
No-one is disputing they have experimented on animals, however, that is not of itself proof doing that 'works' for humans.
You would need to show a causal link otherwise it is just as the old joke about the man sprinkling powder to keep away elephants...'Does it work?' 'Can you see any elephants?!'.
The fact that the man sprinkled powder (the fact that they have experimented on animals) does not of itself prove any causal link to no elephants in the vicinity (to safe/effective treatments in humans). We need to know the causal link.
The fact that there are immeasurably complex differences between each and every species proves why the results from experiments on other species cannot be scientifically / safely applied to humans.
The fact that tiny, tiny genetic differences between individuals of the SAME species make ALL the difference is proven by simple observation eg CF etc.
However, if you know of any scientific case for vivisection then please do tell us what it is...
and if you don't then please think about WHY you are supporting vivisection, and objectively consider the scientific information on the link below.
After all, this is a crucial issue for us all and after around 2,000 years of experimenting on animals humans are still dying of cancer, CF, stroke etc etc etc etc etc.
www.curedisease.net
CatC
says...
3:56am Wed 19 Nov 08
Roger2009
says...
10:32am Wed 19 Nov 08
/blog/60-second-scie
nce/post.cfm?id=does
-a-much-hyped-cancer
-treatment-2008-11-0
9 about cancer drugs, tested on mice, that actually make tumours get bigger rather than smaller. In view of this aren't we entitled to ask what went wrong, why wasn't this observed in regards to the animal testing. The conclusion, as always, is that animal testing has no scientific value but instead is a fraudulent method of legalising drugs which are inevitably tested on humans.
Mr Head
says...
3:30pm Wed 19 Nov 08
Cures and treatments are most likely to come from human biology-based
research, which has an unrivalled record already and is
producing exponentially increased amounts of knowledge with
the new biotechnological tools at its disposal.
CatC
says...
7:17pm Wed 19 Nov 08
"Genes, the basic units of inheritance, which determine an organism’s characteristics, are composed of DNA.
Genes are located in chromosomes, which are located in the nucleus of a cell. DNA is a nucleic acid sequence composed of phosphate, a sugar called deoxyribose, and compounds called bases.
There are four different bases - adenine (A), guanine (G), thymine (T), and cytosine (C). A always pairs with T, and G always pairs with C.......
all species, from insects to humans, plants and animals, follow the same design; not only are they formed from the same DNA units (A, T, C, and G), they are also assembled using the same process.
But while all plant and animal species share the same genetic material, it is the composition, or arrangement, of this genetic material that makes all the difference.......
In the human genome alone, there exist 3.2 billion DNA base pairs -- GC and AT combinations. There is a lot of potential for variability there.
These three billion base pairs are segregated into 30,000 or more genes, and each gene is a code or recipe for a specific protein made of amino acids......
So, whereas all plant and animal species share much of the same genetic material, it is the vast composition, or arrangement, and switching on and off of this genetic material that makes all the difference.......
Very small differences on the cellular and subcellular levels translate into huge differences on the gross or macroscopic level.
It is not just between species, but also within species that small differences present huge discrepancies. That makes the legacy of unraveling the human genome priceless in its ramifications.......
We know that there are several billion letters in the human DNA genome grouped together into about 30,000 genes, all found in the cell nucleus. And each gene has, approximately, between 800 and 2.7 million base pairs.....".
The above is from 'Specious Science', R Greek MD, 2002, I highly recommend this book to anyone genuinely concerned about human suffering from diseases and wants medical progress and safe / effective treatments / cures.
BigAlan
says...
8:10am Thu 20 Nov 08
Oh and your reference to Glaxo was 2003, wake up its almost 2009, research has moved on soooo far.
Roger2009
says...
8:47am Thu 20 Nov 08
My guess is that you are in the business and your future employment depends on the continuing fraud of vivisection.
superdad3
says...
9:41am Thu 20 Nov 08
1. Approximately 10% of NHS hospital beds are occupied by patients suffering side effects of prescription drugs which were tested on animals & declared SAFE. So much for the value of vivisection! (info from published Gov. Statistics).
2. Please don't confuse Vivisection with medical research in an attempt to use emotion rather than reason to support it. Most vivisection is carried out by contract labs etc who will test anything for anyone on any animal under the sun. Soap, toilet paper, cosmetics - the list is endless. As I said, lets not confuse medical research with good old fashioned animal cruelty!
CatC
says...
10:15pm Thu 20 Nov 08
'If CatC, Roger2009 and all the others have so much spare time on there hands writing this rubbish'
What I have posted isn't 'rubbish' it is documented facts, indisputable facts....
of course though if you genuinely believe otherwise you are free to dispute with Factual information any of the details I have posted...
and if you can't......
CatC
says...
10:27pm Thu 20 Nov 08
Ridiculous, that more than 90% of drugs DON'T work in 50%-70% of patients taking them is still true and for exactly the same reason -
ie tiny, tiny genetic variations between individuals of the SAME species make all the difference to how an individual reacts to the drug -
so still now as in 2003, as always, a drug which helps one human can have no effect at all or harm, or even kill, another human -
this is why we MUST end experiments on other species and instead put those resources into scientific, human-relevant research and individually tailored medicines.
For anyone who doubts this do a search for 'pharmacogenetics'.
jsgmn
says...
5:49pm Sat 22 Nov 08
Recently a retiring Leader of an American Cancer Research group said at his farewell dinner. "After twenty five years, we know a lot about curing cancer in mice, but nothing about curing cance in humans" How do the recent "Elephant Man" trial volunteers feel about - "Proven safe in monkeys?"
rabbitman
says...
6:35pm Sun 23 Nov 08
Lindylooloo
says...
10:01pm Mon 24 Nov 08
How very true..
It is in all our interests to seriously question animal testing. You don't have to look very far to see the regular reports of the continuing failures of vivisection, but you do have to look for yourself as it is suppressed. It is very worrying and is a danger posed to us all.
There are too many expert opinions against it, too many records of serious failures, too many differences in species for animal testing for it to have any value at all. Illnesses are induced and so are unnatural, animals do not get the same illnesses, .. It's crazy to think that mice, cats, dogs, goats, cows, sheep, insects could be relevant to humans. It doesn't make any kind of sense. Stop the unnecessary animal suffering now.
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