What is reciprocity and why is it an essential part of One Medicine?” explains founder Professor Noel Fitzpatrick

What is reciprocity and why is it an essential part of One Medicine?” explains founder Professor Noel Fitzpatrick

A link to the news story on the Humanimal Trust website can be found here. The following is a transcript of the Humanimal Trust video.

Humanimal Trust Short Film 2 – What is reciprocity and why is it an essential part of One Medicine?Play

Medical progress does not happen simultaneously – or in parallel – to benefit humans and animals, and that is why we are committed to “One Medicine”.

Many years ago, when I was studying medical history, I came across a rarely used term that described the collaboration between human and veterinary medicine. That term was “One Medicine.”

In his book'Veterinary medicine and human health'said Dr. Calvin Schwabe of One Medicine, which laid the foundation for what we know today as One Health. Now One Health is the approach that examines human, animal and environmental health together to optimize outcomes. But at One Health, the focus is almost entirely on people's well-being. This is not “One Medicine” and it is not fair.

I was so frustrated that little was being done to help animals, and I recognized the crucial role they had played through experiments that produced every drug and implant we have for humans today. I was angry at the lack of ability to apply all this know-how and drugs and implants that animals gave to human medicine for the benefit of my own animal patients suffering from the same diseases that were induced in a normal animal in an experiment. And that's when I knew I had to launch a new platform and lay the foundation for the work that Humanimal Trust is doing today - breaking down barriers and trying to bridge the gap between human and veterinary medicine. A drug that benefits all patients regardless of species.

The main difference is reciprocity. While we fully support the three R's of substitution, reduction and refinement when it comes to the use of animals in research, it was clear to me that the principle of the three R's was missing a fourth R, namely reciprocity. This would benefit not only doctors, related researchers and humans, but all patients regardless of their species. In this way, any medical advances resulting from animal testing would be given back to help animals and people affected by disease.

In One Medicine we look at the significant contributions that animals have made to medical research, giving their lives to help people live better lives. And we believe that studying the mechanisms, causes, effects, and responses of animals to naturally occurring diseases in clinical settings will help reduce the need for animal testing.

Reciprocity is about sharing the benefits of medical advances with people and animals alike. With well-designed and ethically sound studies, and with full parental consent, we could study the disease in an animal that already has the disease, rather than inflicting the same disease on a healthy animal.

It is widely accepted that naturally occurring diseases are actually a better study model than experimentally induced diseases, and studies of naturally occurring diseases would help alleviate the suffering of humans and animals alike. One Medicine focuses on the similarities rather than the differences between humans and animals. And it advocates for the sharing of treatments and medical advances between humans and animals that benefit all patients. It doesn’t “alienate” any other species. And we don’t have to take the life of any animal.

Sources: