Letters, Speeches and Articles
Note from Cynthia O'Neill:
On the 18th of July 2008 I was called to an informal meeting with Dr Peter Carter, Chief Executive and General Secretary of the Royal College of Nursing, Sandra James, Chair of Council RCN and Jane Clarke, Director of Governance Support RCN as a complaint in writing had been made concerning my behaviour at Congress this year (2008).
It is a sad fact that when all peaceful channels fail then other methods become necessary. It is regretted in 2007 my Resolution was out manoeuvred.
2008 my Resolution not accepted. My question to the Minister of Health not accepted and my letter (very short) intended for the Royal College of Nursing Congress daily newspaper was ignored. Each day I spoke to the paper Editor. I was not begging for funds at all. A begging letter took up the space of 6-8 of mine proposed? Yes, it was money for Vivisection. Was this fair to me?
Nurses handling NHS prescribed drugs should be aware that adverse drug reactions is the 3rd biggest Killer in this country and why?
The Resolution I requested "that the Royal College of Nursing demands from Her Majesty's Government that all DRUGS designed for use on the human sick patient be tested on PROPER, SCIENTIFIC computer models and that the useless, erroneous, fraudulent practice of VIVISECTION be ABOLISHED at once on SCIENTIFIC and MEDICAL grounds"
I was told it was political. You could say that about practically everything. The fact is that Vivisection is a Killer.
Due to a heart disorder and various other health problems, I regret that it will not be possible for me to carry out any similar protests or actions in the future; "the spirit is willing, but the flesh too weak."
Cynthia O'Neill
S.R.N, S.C.M., QN., H.V.
25th July 2008
The following is an abridged version of a letter from Cynthia O’Neill S.R.N., S.C.M., Q.N., H.V. which appeared in the Nursing Standard letters column of issue 23 - 11th to 17th February 2009:
The following response by one of our supporters was sent to the letters editor of Nursing Standard on 5th February 2009:
The following Letter from Professor Claude Reiss appeared in the Financial Times letters page under the heading:
Animal Testing Jeopardises Human Health
Sir,
Margot Wallstram, the European Commissioner for the Environment, is correct in saying that we are at present unwittingly testing chemicals on both humans and animals (Letters, October 20). However, she fails to acknowledge that human health and safety are jeopardised by the very animal tests she claims are necessary. Animal tests allow manufacturers to market chemicals whatever their risks to human health, as the selection of animal species and strain, and the test protocol, can be arranged so as to prove that the chemical is safe in animals.
Every year, hundreds of thousands of Europeans succumb prematurely to cancer and dementia, mainly because of chemicals found to be safe in animals, or not tested at all. A range of superior, science-based methods accurately to assess toxicity to humans is already available. The European commission has been informed of these methods, which have the additional advantage of being many times faster and cheaper than animal tests and, of course, do not involve animals.
The European Commission must revise its proposals. It must take advantage of scientific progress and foster rigorous toxicity testing for the benefit of human health and safety, the economy and the environment. Toxicity testing in animals is useless and dangerous; it must be banned, and banned without delay.
Claude Reiss, Alzheim’R&D, F-91190 Gif, France.
Financial Times
27 October 2003
| NB: | Dr Reiss has been a research scientist for over 40 years. His fields of research have included AIDS, Alzheimer’s disease and molecular biology, with over 120 publications in peer-reviewed journals. For the last 21 years, Dr Reiss has devoted himself to the study of toxicology. |
During the time that Professor Claude Reiss was President of Doctors and Lawyers for Responsible Medicine (DLRM) he responded to Tony Blair’s speech, referred to in The Times newspaper of 20th May 2002, as follows:
Thwart Pseudo Science
Prime Minister Tony Blair must be congratulated on his support of scientific research and for understanding that there are huge opportunities in science, both present and future, for medical progress and consumer safety, as well as opportunities for challenging environmental and economic issues.
One assumes that the Prime Minister is referring to ‘good’ science – that is, one which conforms to the standards of logic and objectivity. To the authorities in charge of public health, and to patients and consumers in general, good science is primarily that which achieves fast and cost-effective progress in the prevention and cure of diseases, including the reliable assessment of toxic risks. To ecologists, science is considered good if it contributes to, but does not threaten, biodiversity and does not add to pollution. To economists, good science is one which increases earnings and provides jobs. And to politicians, good science should find strong support from the public, whose commonsense approach to science should not be underestimated.
Mr Blair defends a science which he sees as facing ‘misguided protests’ against experiments using animals as models for human diseases or to assess consumer safety. The question is: do such experiments belong to a valid scientific methodology? In other words, are they ‘good’ science?
For the genuine scientist, the answer is NO. No species can stand as a reliable model for another species, however close in evolutionary terms. The reasoning is logical: the biological activities of the individuals of a given species are unique, because these activities are fully controlled by the unique genetic make-up of each species, as is demonstrated by the impossibility of cross-breeding between different species – the very definition of a species being its reproductive isolation. Our closest relative genetically, the chimpanzee, has an immune system which allows it to withstand our AIDS virus, hepatitis B virus, malaria etc but is much more sensitive than we to arsenic poisoning: and cells from chimpanzees and all mammals, humans excepted, carry on their surface specific markers that preclude any transplanting of foreign cells to humans. How, then, can chimpanzees act as models for AIDS and hepatitis B vaccine development or as models for neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer’s or parkinsonism, all of which they never develop?
When exposed to some chemical in order to assess its toxicity, an animal model will react according to its species-characteristic biological pathways, which may be opposite, similar to or different from those of the (human) species being researched; we will know the answer only when seeing the reaction of the latter. The reaction of the model is therefore of no help, but giving credit to it amounts to playing Russian roulette with our health. We estimate that over 100,000 people die prematurely in this country every year simply because of drugs and carcinogens tested and passed as ‘safe’ – in animal models.
The pseudo-science behind animal-model experiments is potentially deadly to patients and the general consumer and is therefore a heavy burden in social and economic terms. It is also a source of confusion to the public, who see their taxes swallowed up by such futile experiments with no result other than to threaten life and to prolong the absence of progress in curing major diseases – good reasons indeed for protest.
Yes, Mr Blair, support science indeed – true science – and rid it of this deadly pseudo-science.
DLRM response to PM Tony Blair’s speech
DLRM newsletter number 9 Summer/Autumn 2002
Articles
Ministers dropped Vioxx protest after lobbying from US drug firm
By Rob Evans and Sarah Boseley
Private lobbying by an American pharmaceutical company saw government ministers back down from supporting British people who claim one of its failed drugs caused them heart attacks and strokes.
A minister promised in parliament that the government would back their campaign against Merck, one of the world's largest drugs firms. But Whitehall documents obtained by the Guardian reveal Merck immediately put pressure on the minister and helped persuade the government to withdraw its support.
Merck is refusing to compensate hundreds of Britons who say their health was damaged even though the multinational has paid out more than £2bn to 44,000 people in America….
Guardian.co.uk, 4 May 2009
Reports surfaced in the UK media on 20th December 2009 concerning Professor Henrik Thomsen's findings relating to the drug Omniscan and the subsequent law case brought against him by General Electric, the makers of Omniscan. Professor Thomsen is a leading radiologist and his concern stemmed from the fact that several of his patients became afflicted with a potentially life-threatening condition - nephrogenic systemic fibrosis (NSF) - after being given routine scans; these scans were preceded by an injection of the drug Omniscan.
The following article pertains to a review of gadolinium-based agents taken by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA):
FDA to Take a Second Look at Warnings on MRI Drugs
By Jeff Gerth, ProPublica
Federal regulators plan to meet in December to review a 2007 decision to issue a blanket warning about the risks of special imaging drugs that are injected as part of MRI scans.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's determination went against the urging of two reviews that year by FDA doctors who found that an imaging agent made by General Electric presented a greater risk in patients with severely impaired kidneys.
Hundreds of MRI patients who had serious kidney problems have contracted a rare, debilitating and sometimes fatal disease called nephrogenic systemic fibrosis (NFS) after being injected with contrast agents that contain the toxic metal gadolinium.
GE and other manufacturers of the agents all deny liability. As a result of the FDA action in 2007, they have all placed a "black box" warning on the drugs' labels to caution doctors who are weighing whether to use them in patients with kidney disease.
Dr. John Jenkins, director of the FDA's office of new drugs, said in an interview that the agency's advisory committee on drug safety will revisit the decision on warnings and "see if we need to make any changes" addressing the relative risk of different agents.
Regulators in Europe, as well as the American College of Radiology, have issued stronger warnings than the FDA about GE's drug, called Omniscan, saying it appeared to be associated with a larger number of NSF cases than its market share would suggest.
The FDA's medical review of NSF concluded there was an "undeniable and strong association" between the gadolinium-based agents and the disease. Although its own reviewers said the risks of Omniscan appeared greater, the agency decided that all five such agents marketed in the U.S. should have black box warnings.
A key reason for the agency's decision to treat the agents as a class was the lack of data, according to R. Dwayne Rieves, the head of the division responsible for the decision.
But since the 2007 action, a detailed database on NSF cases and MRI scans has been jointly developed by the manufacturers and lawyers for plaintiffs who are litigating several hundred lawsuits in federal court.
www.propublica.org
16 October 2009
Omniscan is one of General Electric's contrast agents. FDA data shows their market share has dropped to 17 percent in the U.S. (for the first 6 months of 2009) from 36 percent in 2006.
There are almost 500 federal lawsuits, plus 155 in state courts, against the makers of contrast agents. Of the federal cases, about 70 percent involve GE, both confounded -- meaning the plaintiff was exposed to more than one agent -- and unconfounded, meaning the plaintiff was exposed to only one agent. This is according to federal court filings. One hundred seventy-three of the federal cases involve allegations of wrongful death; meaning the NSF patient has died.
NB: Similar warnings to those for Omniscan have been issued in the UK on two other contrast agents - Magnevist, manufactured by Bayer HealthCare, and Optimark, produced by Covidien.
‘Nurses earn bonuses for use of latest drugs’
by Jon Ungoed-Thomas and Sarah-Kate Templeton.
Hundreds of nurses on the payroll of the pharmaceutical industry are earning bonuses of £3,500 by identifying NHS patients who can be put on costly new drug regimes.
The nurses are provided for free to GPS’ surgeries where they are given access to patients’ medical records to check whether they are on the most up-to-date drugs.
Although they are barred from promoting their drugs firms’ products, 15% of their pay is linked to the number of patients or records they see. They are routinely backed up by sales teams.
The nurses are described in promotional literature as being able to ‘influence’ new prescriptions for the benefit of their drug companies.
Medicines cost the NHS in England more than £7billion a year, 80% of which is spent on branded products. GPs say there are no incentives to curb their drug bills, which can vary by up to 50% between similar sized surgeries.
Under the scheme, nurses are employed by agencies, but paid by the drugs companies, including GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer and Wyeth. They are sent to surgeries, where they conduct audits to identify patients with conditions such as asthma or diabetes who may benefit form a new drug.
The nurse advisers are paid a salary of about £25,000 and usually a bonus of 10% to 15%. The agencies say they are rewarded for the number of surgeries they visit.
Innovex, an agency based in Bracknell, Berkshire, told an undercover reporter that it pays performance bonuses of up to £3,500 to its nurse advisers.
A recruitment consultant at Royce also told an undercover reporter the job was to identify patients with a specific condition. The consultant said, “(It) opens the doors to a medical representative. They come in and close the business”.
Matt Griffiths, joint prescribing adviser at the Royal College of Nursing, said he believed any nurses who were given bonuses to promote certain products were in breach of the Nursing and Midwifery Council’s code of conduct.
Innovex, which employs about 200 nurse advisers, would not comment on how it paid bonuses, but said it always complied with the industry code.
Sunday Times, 5th March 2006
NB: You will not find any of these nurses within NMRM. Cynthia O’Neill states:
“Any nurse who has anything at all to do with this is, in my opinion, guilty of serious professional misconduct by divulging any details of a patient, however trivial, to any third party, and especially for payment. GPs involved in this are also partners to this serious crime”
The names of virtually all the medicines in the health service are changing, but it seems that no one had thought to tell the nurses.
The Government’s drugs regulator has implemented changes to ensure that names in the UK accord with European law.
But despite the fact that the changes have been effective since December, nurses have been left in the dark until now. Officials began acting only after a nurse contacted the chief nursing officer for England to complain that the changes had not been communicated to the profession.
A spokesman for the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency told Nursing Times: “We have a great big information campaign, but it is being held up by ministers.”
Nursing Times 20th January 2007
In the interest of full transparency, patients’ groups should declare all sources of funding prominently, states an Editorial in this week’s issue of The Lancet.
Many patients’ groups would not exist without funding from the pharmaceutical industry. Those that accept money from pharmaceutical companies have an obligation to declare that funding. While most do, the detail is often buried in the small print on websites, states the Editorial. The Lancet highlights the case of the UK charity CancerBACUP, who have described the results for trastuzumab (Herceptin) in early breast cancer as “impressive”, and the drug itself as a “breakthrough”, in press releases. However, the charity failed to disclose in these releases the fact that the *drug’s manufacturer sponsors the charity. In some releases CancerBACUP also failed to discuss concerns about the drug’s efficacy, adverse events, and cost-effectiveness.
The Lancet comments: “CancerBACUP’s failure to discuss these concerns and to mention its drug-company sponsor in a press release on this topic, undermines the group’s credibility and raises the question in whose interest the group works. The ABPI says that drug-company sponsorship must be “clearly, firmly and prominently displayed on any project, publications, meeting papers, etc”. In the interest of full transparency, patients’ groups should declare all sources of funding as prominently as possible.”
*PLUS 20 others – Glaxo, Pfizer, Roche, SKB, Astra Zeneca…” P.R.
Medical News Today, 3rd July 2006
Shingles risk ‘doubled by drug’
Rheumatoid arthritis drugs called anti-TNF-alpha agents can double the risk of shingles, a study suggests. The research, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, was based on a German study of 5,000 patients.
The Daily Telegraph
18 February 2009
And evidence of the tragic consequences of using the animal model continues to rise (we consider the following to be a very conservative estimate):
Adverse drug reactions cost NHS £2bn
By Sarah Boseley, health editor
The Guardian,
The NHS is spending nearly £2bn a year treating patients who have had an adverse reaction to drugs prescribed for them by doctors, according to new figures from the centre-left thinktank Compass.
The amount of money spent on hospital care for those given the wrong medicine or who have reacted badly to a drug could pay for 10,000 new midwives or easily cover the estimated cost of combating MRSA infections, says Compass.
The health minister Dawn Primarolo confirmed to the organisation that 6.5% of hospital admissions are a result of an adverse reaction. Total admissions in 2006 were 16 million, which means that 1,040,000 patients were there as a result of the drugs they were prescribed.
Compass bases its calculation on an average stay of eight days in hospital at a cost of £228 a day. That puts the annual NHS bill at £1,896,960,000 just for those admitted with ill-effects. It does not include those patients who had a bad reaction to their medicines while they were in hospital. If that cost were added in, the bill would top £2bn.
The new figures, which are substantially higher than any previous estimates, have been compiled as part of an investigation into the pharmaceutical industry, its relationship to public health and regulation. "It is increasingly apparent that the lack of effective regulation is costing the taxpayer, and in some cases is causing unnecessary suffering," said Zoe Gannon, who is leading the Compass investigation.
Scandals such as that over the arthritis painkiller Vioxx, which caused heart attacks, and the antidepressant Seroxat, which was found to increase the risk of suicidal thinking in young people, suggest that industry could do more, she said.
"The industry knew about these adverse drug reactions and chose not to accept the responsibility because its ultimate goal is to make a profit," she said. "From our perspective this £1.9bn figure is not completely reducible - we are going to have to accept some adverse drug reactions - but the sheer size of this figure is enormous. It is all about getting a balance between risk and benefit and we feel that the balance is wrong."
Drug companies have huge profit margins, she said - in excess of 14.3% against a business average of 4.6%. Yet the number of genuinely innovative medicines - as opposed to copies of those already on the market - is decreasing.
"The pharmaceutical industry has the upper hand in terms of research and development investment and is always promising the latest miracle drug but too often failing to deliver,"she added.
"Now is the time for a debate about costs and policies about which drugs the healthcare service can afford as people are paying infinitely higher prices - the drugs bill to the NHS now stands at £11bn - for increasingly marginal rewards and higher risk from adverse drug reactions."
Compass's investigation will question whether it is appropriate for the Department of Health to take the lead in relations with the pharmaceutical industry. It will also be calling for a review of progress since the 2005 report of the health select committee. Compass aims to publish its own report in the autumn.
The Guardian
Thursday 3 April 2008
Antibiotics: Single Largest Class Of Drugs Causing Liver Injury.
Antibiotics are the single largest class of agents that cause idiosyncratic drug-induced liver injury (DILI), reports a new study in Gastroenterology, an official journal of the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) Institute. DILI is the most common cause of death from acute liver failure and accounts for approximately 13 percent of cases of acute liver failure in the U.S.
Science Daily
8 December 2008
Extracts from a Speech by Cynthia O'Neill S.R.N., S.C.M., Q.N., H.V.,
given in Lugano, Switzerland on 20th October 2006
"Evil triumphs when good men and women remain silent. Mahatma Ghandi hated vivisection, and referred to it during the inauguration ceremony of the Medical Academy at the University of Delhi as 'the blackest of all crimes of which humanity is guilty against God and his creation'"
To test a drug designed for the human sick patient on another species, an animal, is plain nonsense. How many of you here are covered in fur, have a tail, four legs, meow, bark or growl? Any? Of course NOT!
Vivisection is scientific and medical fraud.
Switzerland, the home of the lovely book Heidi I so enjoyed as a child. Glorious mountain scenery and lakes. Switzerland, the home of the greatest anti-vivisectionist the world has ever seen. The great Hans Reusch.
'Slaughter of the Innocent' by Hans Reusch, the only book that when read by enough people will get vivisection abolished. A banned book in England, kept off the public library shelves, away from sight. They don't want you to read this.
When I joined the Royal Society for the Protection of Animals (RSPCA) it was with the sole intention of being able as a fully paid up member, to raise an issue at their Annual General Meeting in 1984, or to 'rock the boat', I certainly wasted no time.
It was passed with a standing ovation by many, that the book; 'Slaughter of the Innocent' will be placed in every library up and down the country. The RSPCA have millions of pounds at their disposal. Now, 26 years on, what has been done? You can guess. NIL. What a shambles. Do read about it.
Vivisection.. How does it continue? Unabated? Unquestioned? Unchallenged? Who protects it? Why and how?
Like so many countries, Switzerland is the home of numerous vivisection labs, often underground and very secret. Should a vivisector, known by a nicer name of scientist or bio-technician, dare to 'spill the beans' or tell to the outside world the filthy, dirty deeds and truth, he/she will be sent to prison. Some scientist!
State secrets and yet, you/we the taxpayer and consumer of medicines pay for all of this - the blackest of all crimes.
If medical research labs had glass doors and windows so the public could see, vivisection would be abolished overnight.
It is a true disgrace for any civilised country in this day and age to have even one vivisection laboratory.
Our opponents are everywhere. How often those who oppose us will grab a new face or keen anti-vivisectionist from a stall or meeting. With big money the opposition has succeeded 'the wolf in sheep's clothing'. Many wolves!! "Let's do a stall for battery hens," he'll say - foxhunting and anything else that can distract attention from the fraud of vivisection.
The vivisection industry is so very lucrative, too many fingers in the pie, money, BIG money. The pharmaceutical giants owning the vivisection labs are NOT concerned with our health. They only make money in disease and illness!!
I quote from a September 12th Daily Mail article: "In the UK, 10,000 are killed every year by adverse drug reactions. Another 40,000 each year are ill enough to be admitted to hospital with adverse drug reactions."" This is vivisection. Drugs all safety tested on animals. It is fact that many doctors fail to report drug reactions, so I am sure these figures should be higher.
This is The hardest battle of all to fight. Many of you give your time, your money, and even your health. Some of us suffer false imprisonments, police lock ups, brutality and defamation of our characters.
Good activists, abolitionists of Switzerland, you have done so, so much. Thank you. The latest referendum to get vivisection abolished was an excellent result, considering your situation.
How many enemies have you? I have very many. Good! That's proof of success. Hit them where it hurts, with the truth.
BUAV, NAVS, the wealthy so-called anti-vivisection societies have been at it now for over 100 years. Had they been doing their job properly then vivisection would have been abolished years ago. 'Abolition', to them, is a dirty word.
You are never alone in what you do. Brave men and women all over the world are with us.
0 + 0 = 0. A little + a little = a LOT.
There's a story of two birds sitting on a tree in the snow. "How long will it take for the branch to break,"" said one. He gave a figure and after several thousand snowflakes, SNAP. It broke. So with vivisection, one country will abolish it and then another as others follow like a pack of cards.
Anyone can sign a petition. A letter with a postage stamp on is a gift of time and money to our great and wonderful cause. Write to your Member of Parliament again and write again. Get others to write. Vivisection will only be abolished when there is a law BANNING this most fraudulent of practices.
All evils have eventually been overcome. Margaret Mead said "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed individuals can change the world". Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.
When in Italy and Germany, I asked all to go home and light candles. All the darkness in the world will never extinguish the light from YOUR candle. Let it shine brightly. Be proud.
In years to come, when vivisection is abolished, and it WILL be abolished thanks to you all who do so much; those who have done nothing or just the very bare minimum will bow their heads in shame.
We will WIN. There's no doubt about that!
Remember the birds sitting in the snow? Go home to light your candles.
Thank you for coming."
NB: The above speech was received with a long standing' ovation. Cynthia has stated that she
felt humbled and honoured to have been given the privilege to speak in Switzerland.
She previously has spoken on the fraud of vivisection in Germany and Italy.
Extracts from a Speech by Mrs Babs Diplock to the Congress of the International League ‘Doctors for the Abolition of Vivisection’ (ILDAV)
Paris, 17th June 1989
“My name is Babs Diplock. I have become increasingly disabled over the years since 1967, from medical drugs. But I am more fortunate than many much younger than me, and who are much worse, because I have a wonderful husband and family and a wonderful doctor, who support me, unlike many other sufferers, who are alone.
These are the people I help and fight for. Because we have been made ill by medicines, we are an embarrassment to the Medical Profession and our Government. I am a founder member of the Steroid Aid Group, which was set up to help these people. For 10 years I have helped, consoled, comforted many hundreds – thousands – with severe side effects from prescribed Steroids – NOT Anabolics.
We – I am the proof that Vivisection and the use of animals in medical research does not work. I have 22 side effects. My muscles and bones are weak, wasted. I am losing my sight. My adrenal gland has been destroyed by this medicine. It has destroyed my immune system.
Last year I complained to the British Code of Practice Committee of the Pharmaceutical Society. I showed them the data – the information of the drug manufacturers. It was deceiving and misleading – short on truth. This is an advertisement for steroids in 1968 – it said the side effects were low. Steroids, Prednisolone, Betnalan, Betnesol have been used for 40 years. They produce 50 different side effects and 70 ailments.
…Professor Asscher, Head of our Safety of Medicines, stated on British television “It is only by use that we find side effects. It can be some years before we know the full effects.” (I have this on video). I see this as more proof that the drug manufacturers know that the use of animals is of no value.
So why this industry of animal torture? …It is the alibi of Mr Glaxo, ICI, Rousel, Eli Lily and the others. They say: “See how careful we are to protect you and your children.” Thus the public is conned, as I was, into believing that the drugs are safe, when clearly they are not, as the drug companies well know. No one speaks for us when we are killed or disabled. No one will accept responsibility. They say it will stifle their progress – for progress, read Profits. It will stifle their profits.
I have a letter here from a lady I helped. Each month she gets 12 items on her prescription. Seven items are for steroid side effects. This is pyramid selling and I am one of the end products. “They” put a drug on the market. “They” kill and torture animals, in the name of safety. The drug causes, as in my case and thousands like me, side effects: blood pressure problems, water retention, stomach ulcers, exhaustion, depression; and, hey presto, no sooner said than done – “they” produce a pill for each new pain!
I do the work I do for love – unpaid and unrecognised by the British Medical Association, the General Medical Council, the doctors and the drug firms. I’ve done it for 10 years and will continue ‘til I die, or until the Medical Profession and the Pharmaceutical Industry accept responsibility for their actions…
…We reap what we sow: the barbaric treatment of innocent creatures in laboratories by the drug and chemical industries has resulted in untold damage, not only to people and animals, but to our whole planet.
It should not be left to me to help the patients who have been damaged by prescription drugs. I do not blame all doctors. However, I do think that the whole medical profession must now help to reverse this damage. I need hardly add that I do not mean that yet more drugs should be given, but that doctors should use non-vivisection based therapies and provide support to the disabled victims in their fight for compensation. I have twice had questions asked in the British Parliament on this.
We – I am putting my faith in the enlightened doctors, some of whom have come together in this great International League of Doctors for the Abolition of Vivisection, to speak out against this evil and ensure that there are no more victims.
I would like to thank the Campaign to End Fraudulent Medical Research in Britain and the International League there, for making it possible for me to be here today.
And I would like to thank the International League in Paris for giving me their platform to make my “protest”.
Thank you all for listening.”
Babs continued to do the work she did for love - unpaid and unrecognised by the British Medical Association, and the General Medical Council, the doctors and the drug firms - until she died.
In 1985, Jack Ashley MP presented an Early Day Motion signed by over 100 MPs of all parties.
The motion read:
“That this House deplores the refusal of Merrell Pharmaceutical Company to offer the same compensation to British children damaged by Debendox as that offered to United States of America children; believes that the company has a clear moral obligation to make the same payment to all children who have been damaged regardless of where they live; and calls upon the Government to deplore this discriminatory action and to press Merrell Pharmaceuticals to Treat British and American children alike.”
Debendox Action Group Committee newsletter 1985
"Why didn’t she know"
In the mid fifties a young student nurse in her stiffly starched, well worn third to fifth hand uniform dress from the first day quickly learned she was in the Hospital to learn not to waste time and only speak when spoken to at all times. She was the lowest of the low in the pecking order. Indeed so.
Out on our visits to the Water Works to see how water was purified, to a local large rubbish dump to learn how rubbish was sorted another visit took us to Glaxo. What a scrumptious free tea was laid on for us always-hungry students! There is no such thing as a free tea is there? We had just seen a Glaxo factory and umpteen pills being placed in no end of various containers. Testing on animals? I had no idea at all. Never mentioned and why should it be? In those days Vivisection was kept even more secret and guarded.
Had Glaxo opened one of their Lab doors to us there no doubt would have been uproar.
These ‘free teas, lunches’ etc from the Pharmaceutical giants continue even to this day as a bribe.
Some 40 years on the author Cynthia was to learn how exhausted, greyhound dogs their useful life over were bought on the cheap from nearby White City Stadium and used in heart op experiments, coming in the Hospital in the still of the dark night. As we know documentary evidence shows heart ops on humans were actually delayed for some years due to the basic differences of a dog to man.
Prepare theatre nurse at once for a major op and hurry. “Yes”, it was always hurry! At 2 am one morning a Great Ormond Street student nurse at the same time was ordered. Unusual she thought. Who? What op? Then she was told to return to her ward. The theatre was for a dog to have heart surgery! Not allowed to question authority it all continued. Crazy?
The top floor of the world famous children’s hospital was known as the Zoo.
What little child resembled any of the Zoo animals? Not one! No wonder that after all this time the medical profession is still giving large numbers of very sick children terrible toxic treatments in an attempt to deal with the illnesses they are suffering from.
It was a matter of fact the nurse was not expected ever to know what any vaccine was composed of and even in my student days as a Health Visitor I had no idea as to how a vaccine was made and any side effects were very quietly hurriedly passed over. Ours was not to question why.
Cynthia O'Neill
S.R.N, S.C.M., QN., H.V.
December 2008
"Letter to the BBC in answer to The Big Question"
Dear Sir
Re Professor Stein's comments on his monkey experiments, I ask you to consider the following comments by a true scientist:
Facilities for non-human primate research on the human brain are to be found in practically every country, some of which have been in existence for well over a hundred years. So, why is there still no cure for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson's and the like?
“Even the chimpanzee, our closest relative in evolutionary terms, is no model for research. The human brain has unique characteristics, at the global – anatomy, structure – as well as the cellular – control and regulation of gene expression – levels, not to speak of our brain’s unique capacity for intellectual activities. And the most dramatic difference by far between humans and any other known species is found in our central nervous system.”
Professor Claude Reiss - from DLRM Press Release of 26th November 2002.
The following is quoted from Professor Claude Reiss’s testimony to the Cambridge Primates Laboratory hearing:
“I would never test any drugs on any animal species. However, I am about to test them on human lymphocytes and other human cell lines. If some pharmaceutical company wants to test them on animals, or if the authorities ask that the drug be tested on animals, it is up to them to do so. In any event, I would not pay the slightest attention to their results, since they would not be relevant for humans, because, as I have demonstrated rigorously, no animal species can stand as a reliable biological model for another species, humans included.”
Perhaps you would consider allowing Professor Reiss to speak on any future programme of this sort?
As for the comments made on testing and Cancer, I ask you to consider the following comments by Dr Moneim A Fadali:
“Cancer, is dreaded by all. It runs a close second to heart attacks as a cause of death. When it comes to the role of animal experimentation in cancer, vivisectionists present a creative blend of the spurious ,the fantastic and the ludicrous. A frenzied litany, monotonous, ambiguous, deceitful. Despite all the vivisectionists’ hullabaloo, the fact of the matter is: vivisection is cancer’s Bermuda Triangle in which our realistic hopes faithful expectations and confidence in our research institutions have mysteriously disappeared.”
Dr Moneim A Fadali, MD
See: www.nmrm.org
Yours sincerely,
Holly James.