4 ms·

It's even worse than the un-life like conditions of allowed animal models leading to bad results. With the increasing regulatory burden and outright outlawing

It's even worse than the un-life like conditions of allowed animal models leading to bad results. With the increasing regulatory burden and outright outlawing of animal models in scientific research biological studies are moving to new far-abstracted models that are much cheaper, easier, higher N, and counterintuitively, way, way less predictive of the actual results in human bodies. Testing 1,000,000 compounds in single cell tests (or just chemical binding assays) in a micro-well array has less predictive power and useful outcome than testing 10 compounds in monkeys. At least when it comes to figuring out which things will work in human disease. The giant massively abstracted studies also generate false positives that waste time. But they do generate publications so they're selected for at the funding level. That's part of the reason biological research was so much more productive per $ input last century.

kanzure 4y ago
What's that old joke about mice benefiting from all the research but not humans? Maybe we can switch back to (this time voluntary) human experimentation at some point.
- teddyh 4y ago
  If human experimentation was that more useful, wouldn’t a lot more scientific results be available from countries with more lax laws against it?
  - xwdv 4y ago
    Problem is those countries suck at research.
  - runnerup 4y ago
    Most likely a small handful of backwater countries would allow it. Most of the test subjects would get $500 from pharma giants and horrible disabilities from the side effects. There would be local organizations owned by relatives of politicians that would be statutorially required to be used for oversight, coordination, recruitment, etc. The rulers of the country would take 99% of the profits and 0% of the costs. Think Tuskegee syphilis experiments or Dengvaxia.
klipt 4y ago
> That's part of the reason biological research was so much more productive per $ input last century. Isn't part of it also just that the long hanging fruit has already been picked?
beebmam 4y ago
I don't find this very convincing. Do you have any evidence for this claim breaking down all the different costs for the research and quantified the change in those costs over time, or is this just an apriori argument?
- superkuh 4y ago
  I apologize for my answer being in the form of a youtube video. I hate and ignore it when people link me youtube videos. It's a terrible format for information and discussion. But... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u6ZkAVQfPA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u6ZkAVQfPA "Jack Scannell - Why was biopharma so much more productive in 1950 I DeSci.Berlin" - The main points is the need to formally evaluate biological models. https://www.science.org/content/article/fda-no-longer-needs-require-animal-tests-human-drug-trials https://www.science.org/content/article/fda-no-longer-needs-...
gpcr1949 4y ago
High-throughput screening (HTS), i.e. testing a large amount of compounds in simple biochemical assays can't be compared with testing 10 compounds in monkeys. The point of HTS is finding active substances in a large collection of compounds (finding needles in the haystack), and then using this as the initial step of a whole chemical optimization research program that may lead to a new drug candidate down the line. Conversely, the 10 compounds tested in monkeys will usually be advanced drug candidates just before phase 1 trials in humans. If you would give monkeys 10 compounds from a HTS collection you would learn nothing about what works in human disease because most compounds are inactive at a given target. Every large pharma company has HTS infrastructure and uses this for early discovery (in addition to animal experiments at later stages of drug discovery campaign) - and these companies are interested in making profit by discovering new drugs that meet the requirements to get approved, not in generating publications or boasting about their fancy HTS robot.
refurb 4y ago
There is no replacement for live animal tests at this point. There have been advances in cell models, but they are not a replacement for whole organism tests. They are proxies for living organisms and often not very good ones. There is too much complexity in living organisms to be modeled. It's going to be that way for a long time.

kanzure 4y ago

What's that old joke about mice benefiting from all the research but not humans? Maybe we can switch back to (this time voluntary) human experimentation at some point.

teddyh 4y ago
If human experimentation was that more useful, wouldn’t a lot more scientific results be available from countries with more lax laws against it?
- xwdv 4y ago
  Problem is those countries suck at research.
- runnerup 4y ago
  Most likely a small handful of backwater countries would allow it. Most of the test subjects would get $500 from pharma giants and horrible disabilities from the side effects. There would be local organizations owned by relatives of politicians that would be statutorially required to be used for oversight, coordination, recruitment, etc. The rulers of the country would take 99% of the profits and 0% of the costs. Think Tuskegee syphilis experiments or Dengvaxia.

klipt 4y ago

> That's part of the reason biological research was so much more productive per $ input last century. Isn't part of it also just that the long hanging fruit has already been picked?

beebmam 4y ago

I don't find this very convincing. Do you have any evidence for this claim breaking down all the different costs for the research and quantified the change in those costs over time, or is this just an apriori argument?

superkuh 4y ago
I apologize for my answer being in the form of a youtube video. I hate and ignore it when people link me youtube videos. It's a terrible format for information and discussion. But... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u6ZkAVQfPA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u6ZkAVQfPA "Jack Scannell - Why was biopharma so much more productive in 1950 I DeSci.Berlin" - The main points is the need to formally evaluate biological models. https://www.science.org/content/article/fda-no-longer-needs-require-animal-tests-human-drug-trials https://www.science.org/content/article/fda-no-longer-needs-...

gpcr1949 4y ago

High-throughput screening (HTS), i.e. testing a large amount of compounds in simple biochemical assays can't be compared with testing 10 compounds in monkeys. The point of HTS is finding active substances in a large collection of compounds (finding needles in the haystack), and then using this as the initial step of a whole chemical optimization research program that may lead to a new drug candidate down the line. Conversely, the 10 compounds tested in monkeys will usually be advanced drug candidates just before phase 1 trials in humans. If you would give monkeys 10 compounds from a HTS collection you would learn nothing about what works in human disease because most compounds are inactive at a given target. Every large pharma company has HTS infrastructure and uses this for early discovery (in addition to animal experiments at later stages of drug discovery campaign) - and these companies are interested in making profit by discovering new drugs that meet the requirements to get approved, not in generating publications or boasting about their fancy HTS robot.

refurb 4y ago

There is no replacement for live animal tests at this point. There have been advances in cell models, but they are not a replacement for whole organism tests. They are proxies for living organisms and often not very good ones. There is too much complexity in living organisms to be modeled. It's going to be that way for a long time.