Video: Limit use of animal research
20.12.11
The commitment has been more than ten years in the making since the establishment of a task force by Novo to get rid of redundant product control tests in living animals or to replace them with other methods of testing.
The number of animals used by Novo for such product tests has been reduced over the past few years. In the 1990s, more than 13,000 animals a year were subjected to tests, but this was reduced to 772 animals a year by 2010. The final tests to be done to confirm the quality of a batch produced Novo product were for a virus treatment, performed on November 28, 2011.
Magda Chlebus, director of Science Policy at EFPIA, says:
“The regulatory authorities have to accept with confidence the data that we are generating to authorise products on the market. So we need to convince them that the data developed using these new tools provide as good results for the safety of patients.”
3R Alternatives: Replace – Reduce – Refine
For many years it has been thought that one day it would be possible to completely replace the testing of compounds by the use of modelling and test tube methods. Unfortunately, due to the complexity of the human body, this will not be possible in the foreseeable future.
The principles of the 3Rs – Replacement, Refinement and Reduction – were originally developed by, Professor William Russell and Rex Burch, and are now widely accepted internationally as criteria for humane animal use in research and testing.
Replacement refers to methods, which avoid or replace the use of animals in areas where animals would otherwise have been used.
Refinement refers to improvements to housing and care and procedures, which minimise actual or potential pain, suffering, distress or lasting harm and/or improve animal welfare in situations where the use of animals is unavoidable.Refinement refers to the lifetime experience of the animal. There is evidence that refinement not only benefits animals, but also improves the quality of research findings.
Reduction refers to methods which minimise animal use and enable researchers to obtain comparable levels of information from fewer animals or to obtain more information from the same number of animals, thereby reducing future use of animals.
For further information on animal research, check out the following platform: Animal Testing Perspective.
