%0 Journal Article
%T Human-animal chimeras for vaccine development: an endangered species or opportunity for the developing world?
%A Anant Bhan
%A Peter A Singer
%A Abdallah S Daar
%J BMC International Health and Human Rights
%D 2010
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/1472-698x-10-8
%X Development of human-animal chimeras for vaccine development has been slowed down because of opposition by some philosophers, ethicists and policy makers in the west-they question the moral status of such animals, and also express discomfort about transgression of species barriers. Such opposition often uses a contemporary western world view as a reference point. Human-animal chimeras are often being created for diseases which cause significantly higher morbidity and mortality in the developing world as compared to the developed world. We argue in our commentary that given this high disease burden, we should look at socio-cultural perspectives on human-animal chimera like beings in the developing world. On examination, it's clear that such beings have been part of mythology and cultural descriptions in many countries in the developing world.To ensure that important research on diseases afflicting millions like malaria, HIV, Hepatitis-C and dengue continues to progress, we recommend supporting human-animal chimera research for vaccine development in developing countries (especially China and India which have growing technical expertise in the area). The negative perceptions in some parts of the west about human-animal chimeras can be used as an opportunity for nurturing important vaccine development research in the developing world.We need animal models that can be used to test vaccine candidates against neglected (and less neglected) tropical diseases such as malaria, dengue, HIV and Hepatitis C. These diseases cause morbidity and mortality in large numbers of people, with the developing world bearing the heaviest burden. Vaccine candidate testing in large non-human primates like chimpanzees is very costly, the number of animals available is usually small and there are concerns about inter-animal variability which affects data interpretation; and also most jurisdictions discourage research on large non-human primates due to ethical concerns. Translating laboratory f
%U http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-698X/10/8