AR-News: NAVS Science Advisor, Dr. Ray Greek, on the failure of the animal model and the future of personalized medicine

[Dawn Haney]

Genetic Variations affect drug benefits

In another example of the future of medicine, scientists from Brigham and
Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School have discovered that certain
gene variations cause cholesterol lowering drugs to be less effective in
some people. This could eventually lead to genetic screening to better
predict an individual's response to medication--personalized medicine.
Full article: <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5217159/>
Read a bit of what NAVS Science Advisor, Dr. Ray Greek, has to say about
personalized medicine and the failure of animal testing, in this excerpt
from his latest book, "What Will We Do If We Don't Experiment On Animals?"
Using animals to test new drugs is a failed paradigm and should be—and, in
many cases—is being replaced by pharmacogenomics, in vitro and in silica
analysis and other emerging ADMET research methods. If these methods are
advanced the future looks promising.
If you and your sister are diagnosed with the same type of breast cancer on
the same day, because of your unique genetic profile, you may receive a very
different chemotherapy regime from her. Even though you and your sister have
far more genes in common than you and genetically modified mouse or even
than you and a chimpanzee, she may have a gene that would cause a severe
adverse reaction to one of the medications you will receive, hence another
will be substituted. Or, you may receive a larger and more frequent dose of
the same medication as she receives, because you are a rapid metabolizer of
that drug. Or, you may both receive very different treatments regimes
because even though the cancer is of the same type, you have genes that will
allow it to progress more rapidly than your sisters and hence you need more
aggressive therapy. This is not science fiction; these advances are taking
place even as you read this and many are already in clinical use. But if we
are to expand what is currently being done more research must be done and
not research with entirely different species. (from "What Will We Do If We
Don't Experiment On Animals?" Chapter Seven, Page 178)
For Information on ordering "What Will We Do If We Don't Experiment On
Animals?":
<http://www.navs.org/news/news_full_article.cfm?SectionID=News&NewsID=85>