Replace animals in medical training: PETA

MUMBAI - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), India, has urged medical colleges in Mumbai to replace the use of animals in medical training, a PETA official said Monday.

“Upon learning that the Medical Council of India (MCI) has withdrawn its requirement that every medical school in India maintain an animal house and use animals as teaching models, we have sent a letter to Grant Medical College, Seth G.S. Medical College, Topiwala National Medical College and Lokmanya Tilak Municipal Medical College urging them to replace the use of animals in medical training with modern, non-animal methods,” said vivisection campaign coordinator Dr Anuradha Srivastava.

In addition to making animal houses optional, MCI has recommended that schools adopt computer-assisted models to replace animals. “The amendment follows PETA’s letter to MCI asking that it eliminate the requirement and provide educators with information on non-animal training methods,” Srivastava added.

“Medical colleges now have the opportunity not only to spare animals’ lives but also to provide students with the most modern training methods available,” she said

Srivastava mentioned how medical students are often required to kill frogs by piercing their brains with needles and to cut out the organs of other animals.

“Many top medical-training institutions in the US no longer have live-animal laboratories,” said Srivastava.

“Instead, they use some of the many alternatives to animal experiments, which include interactive computer models, non-invasive human-based experiments and high-tech human patient simulators that breathe and respond to drugs and treatments just as humans do,” she added.

According to Srivastava, PETA has been receiving positive responses from these medical colleges. “We are also offering them assistance in making the transition to non-animal teaching methods,” Srivastava said.