Bioethics and clinical trials on animals

Introduction: The number of animals used in research has increased following the progress and development of medical technology. Every year, millions of animals are used around the world. The pain, distress and death experienced by animals during scientific experiments have been a matter of debate for many years. In addition to the strong ethical issue, there are further drawbacks of these experiments, such as the need for skilled human resources, time consuming protocols and high costs. Now, several alternatives to animal testing have been developed to overcome the disadvantages associated with them but also to avoid unethical procedures.

Aim: The aim of this review was to designate the specific field of tissue engineering that can be an essential tool in the future and lead to the reduction of animal use and the application of the 3RS.

Material - Methods: We used the online data base PUBMED to choose the studies that describe the products of tissue engineering that are being used instead of living animals in experiments. The research took place the months June- August 2018 and again in March of 2021.

Results: Five studies are analyzed: 3 refer to full thickness skins and experimentally demonstrate that it is possible to manufacture materials that can be used for in vitro investigations and the other 2 refer to rebuilt

human epidermis where experimentally using different chemicals controls their reaction to that’s all.

Conclusion:  The new technologies developed in the field of tissue engineering allow us to build functional tissues that can be used as models for risk assessment for humans that may conceal some chemical substances used in the production.

Keywords: tissue engineering, alternative solutions, experiments on animals, bioethics