Mouse Cruelty Criticised
Dr Andreas Stucki of PETA Deutschland has decried the use of mice in “horrific” vape experiments *This article contains an image some may find unsettling*
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by Dave Cross
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A major criticism of mouse research is that it bears almost no relevance to real-world human vaping. In 2015, defunct consumer group ECITA slammed a study by Liverpool’s John Hopkins University for subjecting mice to 2000 times the volume of vapour that a human would experience [link].
Researchers from the Department of Environmental Medicine and the Department of Urology at the New York University School of Medicine subjected mice to a guestimated 10 years’ worth of vape over a 12 week period. They concluded that vaping causes cancer, but expert Peter Hajek commented: “This study shows nothing at all about the dangers of vaping. It doesn’t show that vaping causes cancer. This is one in a long line of false alarms, which may be putting people off the switch from smoking to vaping, which would undoubtedly be of great benefit to them. The best current estimate is that vaping poses, at worst, some 5% of risks of smoking.” [link]
In 2018, University of Texas researchers subjected mice to all-body exposure vape and concluded it leads to cardio-vascular problems in humans. Dr Neal Benowitz said: “The pattern of exposure is different. Humans basically adjust their puffs, taking one when they want. In a mouse, it’s artificial in many ways. You give an animal a strange noxious thing to breathe in and they get pretty stressed out, so who knows what’s going on with them.” [link]
Next year, Prue Talbot at the University of California was called “an idiot” for her attack on mice [link].
Then there was last year’s study, hailed by Stanton Glantz, that prompted one of the best critiques of rodent studies - “This will be helpful to doctors who are consulted by mice thinking of moving into a cage full of smoke or vapour for the rest of their lives” - Professor John Britton [link].
Rodent testing, image from PETA UK
Planet of the Vapes contacted PETA UK and was told that researchers commonly place mice in small tubes and exposed to e-cig vapour for periods of up to two years. Dr Andreas Stucki said that the money being spent on such studies was “wasted”.
Stucki told a journalist from the Daily Star: "In general I believe animal testing is unnecessary and especially in regards to vaping. There was a nicotine addiction study that had to be stopped two years ago because four monkeys died.
“There are so many humans at the moment that either continue to smoke, they switch to vaping, they are dual users, they are completely both - they are the perfect subjects to perform a study on.
"There are endless possibilities that you can use human subjects for and we do not have the natural disadvantage of using animals. It's a waste of money and it could be used in better ways.
“In inhalation toxicology, animal testing is very, very questionable, just imagine, you put them in a tube where they cannot move - already this is a lot of stress for a rat, then they have to inhale four to six hours of something which is potentially toxic, five to seven times a week, for up to two years in a study. It's pretty horrific.”
Related:
- “'Horrific' vaping experiments on pregnant mice slammed by animal rights campaigners”, Daily Star – [link]
Photo Credit:
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous start-ups to develop content for their websites.
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