Vivisection or Science

A leading Italian medical researcher concludes that reliance on animal experimentation and vivisection techniques is scientifically misplaced. He highlights increasing dangers to humans from the assumption that other species are biomedically comparable, and outlines the range of alternatives.

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As the stream of hi-tech drugs continues to multiply and a huge number of animals (in Britain alone, over two and a half million each year) are used in medical experiments, debate continues about reliable methods for biomedical research and their adequacy in protecting human health from new products and procedures. In this book, a leading Italian medical researcher concludes, after years of himself practising animal experimentation and vivisection, that the traditional reliance on these techniques is scientifically misplaced. Published originally in Italian (where it has been through many editions), translated into German and Japanese, and now available in a completely revised and updated edition in English, Professor Croce's classic work constitutes a powerful argument to which both the general public and the medical profession need to pay attention.

He documents with a wealth of fascinating detail precisely how the scientific anti-vivisection movement has constructed a rational case, as opposed to a sentimental or ethical argument. He highlights the increasing dangers to human health resulting from the animal experimenters? assumption that the biological systems of humans and other species are sufficiently similar for valid biomedical comparison. And for the medical researcher, he provides an introduction to the range of alternative methods, including epidemiological research, computer simulation and in vitro techniques.

Professor Pietro Croce headed the Research Laboratory of the L. Sacco Hospital in Milan for many years, in addition to working in various research departments in US and Spanish hospitals. He is the author of a number of medical works in Italian and Spanish.