University ‘animal lovers’ tormenting mice with vaping fumes
Action Alert from All-Creatures.org

FROM CAARE Citizens for Alternatives to Animal Research and Experimentation
February 2020

ACTION

Use this form to send an EMAIL TO WEBER STATE UNIVERSITY.

mice vaping experiments

With news of vaping associated health problems growing, scientists are seeing this as an opportunity to expand animal research.

This includes a group of undergraduate students working in a neuroscience lab at Weber State University in Utah, who are exposing mice to noxious vaping fumes in a misguided attempt to learn more about the potentially addictive effects of vaping on humans.

mice vaping experiments

In the experiments, mice are placed in “vape chambers” or clear boxes the size of a shoebox. At predetermined intervals vaping fumes are pumped into the chamber, filling the boxes with chemical fumes.

During one experiment the mice looked so distressed that the students interrupted a 30-minute long planned exposure.

mice vaping experiments

INFORMATION

Current scientific studies are increasingly demonstrating that mice are inadequate models for studying human health, due to the vast differences in mice and human physiology.

These differences are particularly evident in neuroscience research. A recent study in the prestigious journal Nature demonstrated that differences in the brains of mice and humans result in a tenfold difference in the synthesis of neurotransmitter receptors. [Nature. Sept 2019. PMID:31435019]. This can explain why hundreds of drugs that scientists believe cure mice of diseases like Alzheimer’s, depression and schizophrenia have failed to treat a single person.

Mouse studies are not only poor predictors of psychiatric disorders and drug treatments, they have been shown to predict human toxicity in only 43% of cases. [Curr Pathobiol Rep. 2015. PMID: 26246962]

This failure rate is so pronounced that in 2018 the U.S. National Toxicology Program in conjunction with 16 other federal agencies, released a “Strategic Roadmap” recommending “new approaches to safety and risk assessment of chemicals and medical products that improve human relevance and replace or reduce the use of animals.” This builds upon the U.S. Government’s Tox21 program, started in 2008, that also aims to decrease reliance on animal testing.

Additionally, inhalation studies on animals are unreliable for studying human outcomes due to key differences in the anatomy and physiology of the respiratory tracts of humans and animals. These differences greatly impact the deposition, clearance and retention of inhaled substances and resulting pathophysiology.

Given the demonstrated failure of animal studies to provide human relevant information, Weber State’s use of mice to study the effects of vaping in humans is cruel and incompatible with best scientific practices.

Accordingly, I respectfully request that Weber State end these unjustifiable experiments on mice.


Thank you for everything you do for animals!


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