Replacing Animals With Alternatives

A recent editorial in Nature discusses the pros and cons of replacing animal models with alternatives such as human tissue, organoids, and stem cells. It has been over a year since the FDA Modernization Act 2.0, and the author checks in on the progress of alternative models.

The author notes immunology as one crucial area where model replacement is needed. Though we have learned much from mice, they have not proven to be a good model for human immune response. For example, our different immune responses has led to poor translation between mice and humans for the treatment of sepsis.

While the author admits that some tests cannot yet be replicated in alternative models, they argue that alternatives can do more to weed out failures earlier, before more time and money have been sunk into treatments that will not work in humans.

For more information, head to Nature.