08.08.2024
Every year, on the east coast of the USA alone, around 550,000 horseshoe crabs are pulled out of the sea to drain up to 30% of their blue blood. Many animals do not survive the painful procedure. Their blood is used to test medical products and injection solutions.
This is happening despite the fact that a procedure has been available for 25 years that can replace the blood test and is even superior to it. Now this synthetic procedure is finally being recognized by the US Pharmacopoeia.
This so-called rFC test is already recognized in the EU. However, the European Pharmacopoeia still allows the horseshoe crab test. The nationwide association Doctors Against Animal Testing is calling for it to be removed from the European Pharmacopoeia.
The horseshoe crab has lived on earth for 400 million years. Now it is threatened by the profits of a billion-dollar industry that makes money from its blood. The animals are pulled from the sea, transported to factories, and put on shelves where a thick cannula is inserted into their hearts. The blood that comes out is collected and processed into the Limulus Amebocyte Lysate (LAL) test. This detects certain pyrogens – substances that can cause fever or blood poisoning in humans. Until now, the LAL test was prescribed in the US Pharmacopoeia for products that are introduced into the human body (such as vaccines, injection solutions or implants).
The so-called rFC test, which replicates the LAL test and uses synthetically produced raw materials, has been available for around 25 years. This leads to more precise results and no animals have to suffer or die for it. Now this test is finally recognized by the US Pharmacopoeia.
“This will also have an impact on the German and European markets. Until now, manufacturers who wanted to market their medical devices or injection solutions in the USA had to test their products with the blood-based LAL test. Hopefully this will change soon,” explains Dr. Johanna Walter, scientific advisor at Doctors Against Animal Testing.
The rFC test has been permitted in the European Pharmacopoeia since 2018 as an “alternative” to the LAL test. “However, as long as the test from horseshoe crab blood remains in the pharmacopoeia, it will be carried out. In addition, each product requires complex validation, i.e. comparison, in order to be allowed to use the alternative test,” Walter continues.
Doctors Against Animal Testing is therefore calling for the LAL test to be removed immediately from the European Pharmacopoeia and for a switch to pyrogen testing that is completely free of animal suffering. The rabbit pyrogen test was recently removed from the European Pharmacopoeia. “This must also be possible for the test using horseshoe crab blood,” demands the expert. To express this demand, the association has launched the campaign “Torment in the blood factory – stop the suffering of horseshoe crabs!”, in which citizens can lend their voice to horseshoe crabs via an online petition.
Those: Doctors against animal testing
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