You also mentioned that you use mice for testing purposes, do you think there will be a future whereby we cannot use

Question: You also mentioned that you use mice for testing purposes, do you think there will be a future whereby we cannot use animals and still ensure that it is safe for humans? And if so how? Thank you!
- Keywords:
  animal testing,
  future,
  mice
Asked by anon-254317 to Faith on 21 May 2020.
- Faith Davies answered on 21 May 2020:
  
  Hi, HannanA, good question! I think that is a future we’re all keen to work towards. Have a look at this website if you’re interested: https://www.nc3rs.org.uk/ it shows a lot of the changes that are being made to work towards using fewer animals or alternative testing systems. At the moment there’s just no alternative except to use animals for our research – a common alternative is to use cell-based systems (think cells in a petri dish growing in an incubator), but our disease just can’t be modelled that way. Have you ever seen mini brains? They’re like tiny little brains grown in a dish. At the moment they’re tiny and very simple but if they get bigger and more developed we might be able to use them to learn more about how diseases of the brain work.

Question: You also mentioned that you use mice for testing purposes, do you think there will be a future whereby we cannot use animals and still ensure that it is safe for humans? And if so how? Thank you!