For the love
of Humanity

It’s time to save lives by developing new therapies based on human biology.
Image
Times change.
New knowledge is gained.

With human-relevant science now available, why do we continue to rely on animal testing and conventional in vitro models that fail to predict human response? Shouldn’t we be doing everything possible to relieve human suffering caused by disease?

A change is needed.

The current drug development process is too slow. Too costly. Too unpredictive of actual human response.

No wonder the success rate of drug development programs is only around 10%.

This is a public health issue. Of the 10,000 known human diseases, 9,500 currently have no cure. Because of this, millions of people around the world are needlessly suffering—and even losing their lives.

Current testing methods are inadequate.

It’s a simple fact: animal models are inconsistent predictors of toxic response in humans.

90% of drugs entering clinical trials fail, with approximately 30% failing due to toxicity1.

Toxicity is the primary reason for post-approval drug withdrawal, despite each drug having been declared safe in preclinical animal studies2,3.

A recent study found that of 43 post-approval drugs with serious toxicity effects, only 19% showed direct correlates of toxicity in animal studies4.

We can do better.

Organ-on-a-Chip technology recreates the microenvironment cells experience inside the human body to more faithfully emulate human response compared to conventional models.

Multiple studies have shown that cells grown in Organ-Chips closely mimic in vivo cells both in behavior and in gene expression profiles5-8. What’s more, 70% of the researchers who have used Organ-Chip technology rate it as more predictive than animal models9.

It’s time.

For the love of humanity, it’s time to use the latest technology to relieve the agony and sorrow caused by currently untreatable diseases.

Time to speed drug discovery. Time to use more predictive testing to weed out toxic drugs sooner. Time to reduce our dependency on animal testing.

Related Resources

Human Liver-Chip for predictive toxicology: Performance assessment and economic implications

Predictive Toxicology: Organ-Chips Demonstrate Superior Performance to Animal Models and Spheroids

Predicting Hepatotoxicity with the Liver-Chip

Emulate CEO Submits Testimony in Support of FDA Modernization Act

Emulate Endorses Humane Research and Testing Act

The Time is Now to Reduce the Use of Primates for Drug Testing

  1. Sun, Duxin, et al. “Why 90% of Clinical Drug Development Fails and How to Improve It?” Acta Pharmaceutica Sinica B, Feb. 2022, 10.1016/j.apsb.2022.02.002.
  2. Babai, Samy, et al. “Safety Data and Withdrawal of Hepatotoxic Drugs.” Thérapie, Feb. 2018, 10.1016/j.therap.2018.02.004. Accessed 18 Mar. 2020.
  3. Siramshetty VB, Nickel J, Omieczynski C, Gohlke BO, Drwal MN, Preissner R. WITHDRAWN–a resource for withdrawn and discontinued drugs. Nucleic Acids Res. 2016;44(D1):D1080-D1086. doi: 10.1093/nar/gkv1192
  4. Bailey J, Thew M, Balls M. An analysis of the use of animal models in predicting human toxicology and Drug Safety. Altern Lab Anim. 2014;42(3):181-199. doi: 10.1177/026119291404200306
  5. Apostolou, Athanasia, et al. “A Novel Microphysiological Colon Platform to Decipher Mechanisms Driving Human Intestinal Permeability.” Cellular and Molecular Gastroenterology and Hepatology, vol. 12, no. 5, 2021, pp. 1719–1741, 10.1016/j.jcmgh.2021.07.004. Accessed 13 Apr. 2022.
  6. Si, Longlong, et al. “A Human-Airway-On-a-Chip for the Rapid Identification of Candidate Antiviral Therapeutics and Prophylactics.” Nature Biomedical Engineering, 3 May 2021, pp. 1–15, www.nature.com/articles/s41551-021-00718-9, 10.1038/s41551-021-00718-9.
  7. Kasendra, Magdalena, et al. “Duodenum Intestine-Chip for Preclinical Drug Assessment in a Human Relevant Model.” ELife, vol. 9, 14 Jan. 2020, p. e50135, elifesciences.org/articles/50135, 10.7554/eLife.50135. Accessed 17 Feb. 2022.
  8. Sheyn, Dmitriy, et al. “Bone-Chip System to Monitor Osteogenic Differentiation Using Optical Imaging.” Microfluidics and Nanofluidics, vol. 23, no. 8, 6 July 2019, 10.1007/s10404-019-2261-7. Accessed 13 Apr. 2022.
  9. LINUS Group, 2022
  10. Ewart, et al, Qualifying a human Liver-Chip for predictive toxicology: Performance assessment and economic implications.