Animal testing

Animals without backbones aren't given anywhere near the same protection or oversight.

Animal research isn't going anywhere anytime soon, because there are things we can only learn by bringing animals into a lab.

But there are still lots of important ethical issues we're still working through.

There are also things we can only learn by observing animals in their natural environment.

Right.

You know, I think we would probably be having a very different conversation around animal research if, uh, we weren't, you know, we as a species, we as a culture weren't just casually slaughtering millions of animals to eat them every single day.

Uh, and so that is a background against which the, the relatively minuscule number of animals used in research, uh, it, it becomes almost impossible to understand why someone would point to That ridiculously small number of animals, uh, used in research when the vast, vast majority of, uh, animals that humans use and end their lives are done for food.

In that context, uh, we do animal research because we have to.

There's no other way around it.

If tomorrow, uh, laws were changed and the FDA said, "Okay, you can do some of this early experimentation in willing human participants," that would be a very interesting option.

I am a neuroscientist developing non-animal models, using simulations and organoids to replace animals for neuroscience research.

But you've also argued that even the animal research that people have been doing isn't actually maybe as relevant to humans.

It doesn't have a great track record of being as relevant to humans as we might think it is.

No.

One, can you unpack that, explain a little bit more about it? And two, if that is the case, why is this so institutionally entrenched? Which I think that's also relevant to this AI conversation.

Yeah, good question.

I do think that we can overstate the scientific benefits of animal research in various ways.

Now, of course, animal research has been part of a broader scientific and medical research enterprise that has made tremendous progress over the centuries, over the treatments and vaccines and many other interventions that have improved and extended lives and all of that should be acknowledged.

We'll start with the strongest evidence, and we'll formulate an evidence ladder.

We'll have randomized trials at the top, population data in the middle, and animal research at the bottom.

Most explanations of this topic start with the animals and work up.

I'm going to do it the other way, the way I'd read a chart.

Useful for confirming the pattern, but not for proving cause.

Rung five, the foundations in animals.

At the base of the ladder is more than a decade of animal research.

I'll start with the animals closest to us.

Dr. Hughes, good morning.

A nor'easter is about to hit the northeast, so we thought this would be a good apocalyptic day to talk about animal testing.

Well, and it is also a very opportune week.

We actually planned this topic before a lot of things happened this week, but I have a brief introduction to get us up to speed.

The European Union has long led the charge with stringent bans on animal research and reduction frameworks.

But over the last week, we have witnessed an astonishing acceleration here in the United States.

Under the Department of Health and Human Services and the FDA, there's a renewed push, ironically championed by those within the MAHA movement, the Make America Healthy Again movement, that has finalized rules recognizing non-animal testing methods backed by major NIH investments in human-based research infrastructure.

For generations, the medical establishment had defended animal models as a tragic necessity.