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News Archive
"Infection Surveillance Proposals For Animal-To-Human Transplants
Show That The Technology Is Too Hot To Handle", Says Ethics Report.
This week, xenotransplantation pressure group Uncaged Campaigns
has submitted comments on the "Draft Report of the Infection Surveillance
Steering Group of the United Kingdom Xenotransplantation Interim Regulatory
Authority (UKXIRA)."
The submission analyses the proposals contained in the draft document,
and concludes that the UKXIRA should "act in accordance with the
bioethical framework that underlies its regulation of xenotransplantation,
and recommend to the Secretary of State for Health that the technology
be outlawed immediately."
Dan Lyons, author of the submission, said:
"I was fairly sceptical about the report before I read it,
and having studied the report closely I’m extremely concerned because
it shows that dealing with the threat of viruses from pig tissue will,
in practice, be impossible. There are huge, gaping holes in the proposed
surveillance regime, not least the fact that it is not legally enforceable.
On the other hand, it is so complex and draconian that recipients and
their contacts will find it impossible to comply voluntarily.
"With the best will in the world it would be impossible to
claim with any certainty that any virus outbreak that emerges from xenotransplantation
could be controlled and contained. The real value of the draft report
is that it shows that the whole enterprise is intrinsically dangerous
and threatens to breach basic human rights.
"The immense financial and social costs of these proposals,
and the fact that they will still not safeguard public health, means
that when the regulators apply the cost/benefit analysis that determines
whether xenotransplantation should go-ahead, they should decide to ban
the technology."
For full copies of the eight page report, interviews and comments, please
contact Dan Lyons on 0114 2530020 or 07990 584158 or click
here to find it in the xenotransplantation section of this site. See
below for a summary of the conclusions of the report.
Summary of conclusions:
- In practice, no xenotransplantation infection surveillance programme
can be expected to provide adequate safeguards to public health.
(See Section 3 of main report.)
- In practice, recipients of xenografts will be unable to fulfil all
the necessary conditions "consistently and for life."
- The likelihood of close contacts, especially future contacts, complying
with necessary requirements is even more remote.
- Any success that xenografts might achieve will increase the chances
of non-compliance and xenozoonosis because of complacency and the frequency
of operation increasing the probability of a xenozoonotic event occurring.
- Latent infections pose extreme difficulties for detection, control
and treatment. Unknown viruses are similarly problematic.
- The proposal to relax surveillance requirements in the event of routine
xenotransplantation is incredible.
- In practice, it will be difficult to obtain valid consent from recipients.
- No proposals have yet been made to obtain consent from society in
general, which is necessary given the social risks of xenotransplantation.
- It would be impractical and a breach of basic individual human rights
to enable society to protect itself from the threat of xenozoonosis
by enforcing surveillance requirements through legislation. This is
a very serious ethical and practical cost of xenotransplantation.
- In practice, voluntary compliance with surveillance requirements by
recipients and contacts is unreliable and inadequate as a safeguard
to public health. (See page 6)
- The cost of setting up and running the surveillance infrastructure
will be prohibitive and not an effective allocation of scarce health
care resources.
- It is highly likely that human error will occur at various points
in the surveillance infrastructure, further compromising public health.
This analysis of the document demonstrates quite clearly that on grounds
of social cost alone, the xenotransplantation project should be abandoned
and research into xenotransplantation stopped immediately. We believe
that there are irrefutable arguments in favour of legislation for the
purpose of banning xenotransplantation.
However, these social costs are not the only ones to be taken into account.
The case against xenotransplantation proceeding is further strengthened
when we take into account the suffering, exploitation and destruction
of animals and incorporate these into our cost/benefit analysis. While
some may argue that it is worth continuing to research xenotransplantation
in the hope of overcoming its practical difficulties, to do so would not
only be an example of wishful thinking, but it would also completely ignore
the on-going suffering of animals inherent to such an approach. Such ignorance
is unacceptable and contrary to the guiding ethical principles of the
UKXIRA.
Therefore, we strongly urge the UKXIRA to act in accordance with the
bioethical framework that should underlie its regulation of xenotransplantation,
and recommend to the Secretary of State for Health that the technology
be outlawed immediately.
Dan Lyons, Uncaged Campaigns (05/11/99)
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