'U.S. medical institutions do not use animal models'

By Our Staff Reporter

CHENNAI, APRIL 19. Students in American medical institutions no longer learn medicine using animals and are, therefore, better trained. Instead they use computer simulation and synthetic materials to learn the art of surgery, said Dr. Jerry W.Vlasak, diplomat, American Board of Surgery and Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, here today.

Speaking at a workshop on `Advances in medical education', he said, more than 100 institutions were functioning in the U.S., but almost all of them had closed the animal laboratories following a consensus reached two decades ago among the teaching faculty.

Many medical schools in the U.S., including Harvard, have turned to artificial human models for teaching a variety of medical techniques.

People with diseases volunteer to test drugs on them and so it was not necessary to test drugs on the poor animals, he felt. Similarly, many schools in the country have given up `vivisection'. Though there was no national law banning vivisection, some of the States had banned it, he said.

All these educational institutions were using computer simulation, documented video tapes and other mannequin materials to do surgeries, he said. Installing a software and hardware for computer simulation was not expensive, he said, and added that it could be also demonstrated to a large number of students.

Stressed animals provide only unreliable results. Newer methods were faster, cheaper and more accurate, he said. Experimenting on animals for human benefit was not science, he said, and on several occasions, extrapolation from animals had harmed human beings.

Ms. Prema Veeraraghavan, expert consultant, Committee For the Purpose of Control and Supervion of Experiments on Animals (CPCSEA), and Mr. Arun Rajan, PFA volunteer, were among those who spoke. The programme was organised by the Chennai Chapter of People for Animals.

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