Occupation of experimental mice

An experiment is a participant in the Douglas Hospital in Montréal, Canada ( Photo: TTO )

Recently, the story of an experiment of drugs for leukemia and sclerosis of TGN 1412 in London shocked the public because of dangerous overdose .

He looks like a human - elephant

At Northwick Park Hospital in London early last week, within minutes after eight "white mice" received the injection, the incident occurred. This is the first human body test for the drug TGN 1412 used to fight leukemia and sclerosis. It is unknown where the problem occurred where six people who were injected with the real drug started "transforming".

Telling this story, Raste Khan - one of two people who received a placebo dose ("fake medicine", has no effect or harm, is often used in experimental procedures), his voice is trembling: " People Sitting close to me, I vomited, he fell over. He looked very painful, following him, the other five people also fell like dominoes, all vomiting. headache and not breathing ". Myfanwy Marshall, a girl who received a placebo dose, her face was pale with fear: " I wanted to faint when I looked at the person sitting next to me. He looked like a person - an elephant, his head was three times bigger, his legs were bigger. His face moved continuously between mauve and yellow . "

British Prosecutor Ann Alexander proved suspicious that the drug had not been successfully tested on the animal before giving it to humans: a representative of TeGenero revealed in one contact with a family member. That a dog died during the experiment. However, TeGenero did not directly conduct experiments but assigned it to Parexel, an American company. Prosecutor Ann Alexander questioned the investigation.

Young people.

In order to have enough "experiments", companies post small advertisements or play tricks on the Internet. The target audience is students who are always eager to earn less money to pay for their increasingly expensive education.

According to The Guardian journalist Tom de Castella, Parexel has repeatedly posted an SMS system worth £ 1,300 for making three-day "white mice" and $ 2,000 for a week. In addition to students, addicts and immigrants from third countries are also subject to text messaging.

" They are very happy to be hospitalized for a week as a test subject so they can go out and hold a big enough money to go to college and buy a computer or go skiing in the winter " - the journalist Tom de Castella explained. In the Parexel case, each "white mouse" was promised to pay $ 4,600.

In the experiment, the "tank" above, Raste Khan and the rest were all students. He confessed to enrolling for money: " I want to make the most of my university time without having to share my part-time jobs. But this is not worth it ."

In the UK today there are about 350 phase 1 human trials per year (on a small group) and are often assigned to "re-contracted" laboratories of private companies, such as the US Company. Parexel for TGN 1412.

SUPPLY ( The Guardian, Le soleil )