Well, I woke up this morning and found the world had turned itself clean upside down, again, like a cat chasin’ its tail. The Food and Drug Administration, that grand fortress of red tape and rubber stamps, has made a proclamation as bold as a rooster at sunrise–they say we don’t have to torment animals in the name of science no more—at least not for every newfangled pill that some chemist cooks up in his copper-bottomed laboratory.
In all its wisdom, The FDA has announced it’s phasin’ out the old requirement that drugs get tested on animals before being sold to that great experimental subject known as the American Public. They claim we now have better ways—”human-relevant methods,” they say. That’s government talk for somethin’ your aunt wouldn’t understand, but your nephew in spectacles might.
The alternatives are as curious as a three-legged horse in a footrace–computer simulations built with artificial intelligence (a fancy term meanin’ your thoughts are no longer your own) and somethin’ called “organoids,” which sounds like a disease but is a tiny human-like organ that don’t complain, bite, or sue for damages. They grow these wee lumps of human mimicry in dishes, and they can tell you if your new miracle medicine will cure the common cold or burn a hole through your liver.
Now, you might ask, “Why the sudden kindness to creatures great and small?” It turns out Congress, that pack of well-fed squirrels, passed a law back in 2022 sayin’ we could skip the critter trials if we had somethin’ better. And the FDA, in a moment of peculiar clarity, decided to go ahead and use the power granted to ‘em.
The commissioner said this’ll make medicine cheaper and get it to folks faster, which is a fine goal. Though I must say, the last time someone promised me somethin’ faster and low-priced–it was a bus ticket to Sacramento, and I ended up in the mud near the Feather River with a dog chewing on my boot.
Still, I suppose it’s a happy day for the rabbits and monkeys who’ve spent the better part of the last century takin’ experimental heartburn medication so we could eat spicy chili without fear. They’ve done their duty for God and country, and now they can retire with honor—perhaps to a peaceful life in some leafy glen or at least to a lab with less pokin’ and proddin’.
As for the rest of us, let’s hope the organoids and artificial brains don’t start unionizin’ or demandin’ benefits because once machines get a taste for bureaucracy, we’ll all be test subjects—willing or not.
The Old Blog in the Desert 
Leave a comment