Safari cats “sacrificed” (look bottom right hand side of the document reproduced below, please scroll down) in the cause of stem cell research.
As I am sure you have realised the word “sacrificed” means killed. The Safari Cats were killed (on my reading of this document) because these cats were “irradiated” (subjected to radiation), which destroyed the stem cells and these cells failed to “regenerate”. This resulted in the death of the cats. It may have been that the research required that the stem cells be destroyed to see it they regenerated “in vivo”.
Below is a photograph from one page of a scientific research article on a study into how blood forming cells (hematopoietic stem cells) behave in large animals. The technical description is, “To study the behavior of hematopoietic stem cells in vivo”. “In vivo” means that which takes place inside an organism. The large animals selected where Safari cats. Six safari cats were used in the research. I believe that this image can be reproduced here as the webpage from where it came says, “The citation, abstract, and first page are available below”.
This is the fulll heading:-
Behavior of Hematopoietic Stem Cells in a Large Animal
Janis L. Abkowitz, Monica T. Persik, Grady H. Shelton, Richard L. Ott, J. Veronika Kiklevich, Sandra N. Catlin, Peter Guttorp
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Vol. 92, No. 6 (Mar. 14, 1995), pp. 2031-2035 http://links.jstor.org
The website is:- Scholarly Journal Archive. The web page can be seen here
No criticism is made of anyone involved. But I find this very strange indeed. Obviously the Safari Cat has certain physical characteristics that make her suitable for research like this. Otherwise why use such an animal. Don’t misunderstand me. Although I am a person who leans towards the belief that any animal testing is wrong, I do understand the benefiits and the difficult issues posed. Why, though, should humans benefit at the expense of the lives and welfare of our fellow creatures? It implies thaty we are more important than other animals – are we? In this instance the “Rolls Royce” of exotic cats, the Safari Cat, is being killed for the sake of research. What do you think about that? Do you think that it makes a difference if it is a Safari Cat or any cat – both are wrong?
