Where to start

Nowadays multiple solutions have been postposed in order to stop animal testing and still ensure a future in which humans feel safe, some of this solutions are:

• Cell Cultures: 

This procedure relies on the creation of 3D organs composed of human cells grown in a laboratory, the miniature human organs can provide a more realistic way to to test new therapies. Human cells are used for creating innovative little devices called  “organs-on-chips” that can be used instead of animals to study disease processes and drug testing. Some devices that have been  created can mimic accurately the lung, heart, kidney and gut. The outcome that this device aims to have is to be able to construct a whole “human- on-a-chip” . Nowadays, Cell cultures have been central to key developments in areas such as cancers, sepsis, kidney disease and AIDS, and are routinely used in chemical safety testing, vaccine production and drug development. This means that the procedure works and should be considered as an option to avoid animal use when experimenting . 

• Human Tissue: 

Humans can also volunteer to donate their tissue (both healthy and diseased are acceptable ) . In fact,  Human tissue can also be used after a person has died (post-mortems). Post-mortem for instance, brain tissue has provided important leads to understanding brain regeneration and the effects of Multiple Sclerosis and Parkinson’s disease. This proves that by donating these tissues the studies of human biology and diseases can be even more relevant than the ones that are carried with animals as subjects. Human tissue can be donated from different surgeries either biopsies, cosmetic surgery and transplants. Some companies have already started to produce these tests. An example of this practice is the use of eye and skin models made from reconstituted human skin and other tissues that are used to replace the cruel rabbit irritation tests. 

• Computer models:

Throughout the years we have seen the significant advances that have been made regarding technology, why not using this to avoid the suffering of living organisms? This is the solution of computer models , they have the ability of modeling and replicating the aspects of a human body. Some examples of what  have already been created are the heart, lungs, kidneys, skin, digestive and musculoskeletal systems already exist.  This process works by using virtual experiments based on existing information and mathematical data. 

• Volunteer studies:

With the consent of humans and the well managed and security of these practices, we would be able to use sophisticated scanning machines and recording techniques on ourselves. One proof that these processes work are brain damage machines  that can ‘see’ inside the brain and can be used to monitor the progression and treatment of brain disease.  They can help researchers understand the causes by comparing them with healthy volunteers. Furthermore, micro endorsingcan help us to measure how different drugs behave in a human body, this works by injecting the drugs into human volunteers and measuring (usually in blood samples) using a very sensitive measuring device called an accelerator mass spectrometer. Less high-tech studies for nutrition, drug addiction and pain can also be carried out on consenting humans in the interest of advancing medical science. These studies can eventually help to replace animal tests.

Still, we have to consider these options since most of them are actually quite reliable and better for us to understand different diseases, it shouldn’t be a matter of how we used to work and what we discovered in the past, we should be able to accept that as years pass by,

progress comes with it , we need to accept this progress in order to maintain peace between us and other living organism. It is unacceptable that we prefer to maintain the traditional procedures instead of working for finding better alternatives , we are capable of doing so much more for our society, but this can only happen if we are also able to accept changes and modifications, if we are able to do better and to understand that not always what originally works is the best.  As a matter of fact, we should consider the human breakthroughs that have been made in these years, being them: 

• As we know , insulin was discovered when scientists removed the pancreas of a dog in 1920 and studied it. But,  like other areas of medical research, the important clues actually came much earlier from observations of human patients.
• Brain surgery in Parkinson’s patients identified the best place for Deep Brain Stimulation electrodes to be placed in the brain to improve symptoms, decades before a claimed ‘discovery’ in monkeys.
• Alois Alzheimer the man who discovered the main features of Alzheimer’s disease in 1906 by studying brain segments from patients after they had died.
• Human population studies led to the discovery that smoking causes cancer. We can’t prove this with mice and rats (Animals that are likely to be used in testing) since smoking does not cause cancer in them.
• The main cause of stomach ulcers were discovered by an Australian doctor that used himself in an experiment. He did this by drinking a culture of bacteria and later getting sick before curing his symptoms with antibiotics.
• After discovering that aspirin relieved the pain in a patient with toothache, a German chemist started to test it on him to prove its use. 

We have to acknowledge the fact that  some alternatives work even better without having to use animals to test them , some statistics show that : 

• Crude skin allergy tests in guinea pigs only predict human reactions 72% of the time. But a combination of chemistry and cell-based alternative methods has been shown to accurately predict human reactions90% of the time.
• The notorious Draize skin irritation test in rabbits can only predict human skin reactions 60% of the time.  But using reconstituted human skin is up to 86% accurate.
• The standard test on pregnant rats to find out if chemicals or drugs may harm the developing baby can only detect 60% of dangerous substances.  But a cell-based alternative (EST) has 100% accuracy at detecting very toxic chemicals.
• The cruel and unreliable shellfish toxin testing on live mice has now been fully replaced with a far superior analytical chemistry method that is better at protecting humans.

Nevertheless, as we know now, most of the guilt relies on big enterprises that haven’t changed their way of manufacturing their products , but, we as consumers also have a say in this,since we tend to encourage the development and marketing of new products , which turn results into more animal testing. There are multiple things that we can do to change this system. For this to happen, we have to consider how companies manipulate the information that they give to us, take as an example,  when many of them   state that they do not test their ‘products’ on animals, but in many cases they test the ingredients, or they pay an external company to do the testing for them., this is why we have to first, avoid buying new improved formulations and scond , see if a company makes claims about animal testing and questioning what these claims mean. There are three important criteria for an effective ‘cruelty free’ testing policy:

• The company manufacturing the product does not originate, endorse or finance any form of testing on animals. This includes testing by the company themselves or through contractors at any stage of product development, production or marketing.
• The product must not contain ingredients tested on animals by or on behalf of the company after a fixed cut-off date. This means the company uses only established ingredients which need no further animal testing.
• The policy includes a commitment to take reasonable steps to achieve a reduction in, and eventual ending of, animal use in regulatory testing and product development. Funding research into humane alternatives to animals testing is one way to help achieve this.

By considering this, the impact we have can radically change. Our best option is for us to maintain informing ourselves about this topic, adn looking for ways in which we can provide our help. also, leaving indifference behind and getting more involved as an active consumer.