Animals Used for Medical Research

* Re “Animals Hold the Key to Saving Human Lives,” Commentary, Feb. 5:

Joseph Murray uses the recent baboon-to-human bone marrow transplant to defend animal research and to attack “extremist” organizations such as the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) that oppose this experiment.

Murray’s timing could not have been worse. Shortly after his commentary appeared, the experiment was declared to be a failure. The injected baboon cells failed to thrive, much less join forces with the patient’s own immune system. While this is unfortunate for AIDS victims, it was what virtually all observers expected.

Murray may have sensed that the baboon experiment would not pan out as a treatment for AIDS. Therefore, he offers an alternate (and novel) justification: “The research . . . will enable doctors someday to treat leukemia, aplastic anemia and lymphoma. . . .” Come again? An AIDS experiment that apparently can’t deliver the goods on AIDS is not likely to yield treatments for other diseases.

The HSUS opposes baboon bone marrow transplants not because we believe that “humans have no right to interfere with animals.” These experiments are simply too medically questionable to warrant the killing of nonhuman primates. The failure of the first such experiment only reinforces our view that help for AIDS victims should be sought in more promising arenas.

MARTIN L. STEPHENS PhD

Vice President for Animal

Research Issues, HSUS

Washington

* I agree with Murray 100%. I do not think physicians should be expected to treat members or sympathizers of groups that take an extreme animal rights view.

If these animal extremists were sincere, they would refuse to take any medication or to benefit from any procedure that resulted from experiments on animals.

REGINA K. FADIMAN

Los Angeles

* In his column on the importance of animal experimentation in the field of human health care, Murray states: “Without taking the time, braving the risks and paying the costs, there can be no success.”

It seems to me that it is the animals that are “braving the risks.” They are also “paying the costs”--quite frequently with their lives.

DESMOND LEIGH-HUNT

Santa Barbara

* If animals hold the key to saving human lives, we are all doomed because they will be used up long before we are “saved.”

Vivisection uses million of animals of all species worldwide every year. Are we “cured” or even healthier? Maybe we are looking in the wrong place?

JULIE FERNEE

Pacific Palisades