Animal Writings

We have relied too heavily on animal testing, an we believed in it too strongly. Now I think we are commencing to realize that what goes on in an animal may not necessarily be applicable to humans.

— Marvin Pollard, former president of the American Cancer Society

From a scientific standpoint, what is pertinent is that..."animal model systems" in cancer research have been a total failure...not a single new drug for the treatment of cancer was first picked up by an animal model system. All of the drugs in wide current clinical use were only put into animal model systems after finding clinical clues to their therapeutic possibility. The money was spent...for two main reasons. First, it was a highly profitable undertaking for certain medical schools and research institutions that were incapable of doing any genuine cancer research. Second it was sustained by a superstitious belief in a grossly unscientific notion: Mice are miniature men...In sum, from the standpoint of current scientific theory of cancer, the whole mystique of the animal model systems is hardly more than superstitious nonsense...the moral is that animal model systems not only kill animals, they also kill humans. There is no good factual evidence to show that the use of animals in cancer research has led to the prevention or cure of a single human cancer."

— Dr. Irwin Boss, 1990, Journal of the National Cancer Institute