Animal testing is a crucial part of developing new medicines, but it is accompanied by a host of ethical concerns. Stem cell models could eventually make it unnecessary.
Nowadays you can order a rat with Parkinson’s Disease or a naturally diabetic dog as you would any product on internet, but the ethical issues surrounding animal testing beg the question, are there equally relevant models that don’t come with the moral dilemma? There are indeed alternatives, but they may not be obvious.
Stem cells could be one of the alternatives, according to the European Commission’s Joint Research Center on alternative methods to animal experimentation in research and regulation. While attention to stem cells has been focused on potential in regenerative medicine, they have also earned a reputation in R&D for their capacity to produce human tissues and to model diseases. Indeed, they could lead to the development of more ethical, efficient and economical tools that could fast track R&D.
