Miscellaneous
The new #COVID19 corona virus pandemic has changed the world as we knew it in many ways. As scientists and government regulatory bodies rush to find a cure, treatment or therapy for those infected and affected by this new disease, we pause to reflect on the role that laboratory animals will play in bringing a new legal drug to market. While there may be exceptions to the rule (such as in the case of state legalized marijuana in the United States), legal drugs don’t hit the market without extensive safety and efficacy testing in animal models. Animal research can be a taboo topic when so little information is known about the facts. In this week’s episode, Legal Drugs Podcast host, Angela Stoyanovitch (B.A., LATG), introduces Dr. Cindy Buckmaster, PhD, CMAR, RLATG). Cindy is an outspoken advocate for necessary animal-based research and animal welfare. She loves animals and honors the role they play in our lives. In the mid 1990s Cindy left her tenure career as a high school science teacher to study how the brain supports learning and memory. All of her work was with monkeys. In this process, Cindy learned important truths about animals in research. After earning her doctorate in Neurobiology and Behavior at SUNY Stony Brook and completing her postdoctoral work at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Cindy decided she would dedicate her career to the compassionate and emotional connection we humans share with animals within biomedical research settings. She noticed a lack of emotional validation of the natural bonds formed between animals and the people working with them and created training and education programs for researchers and laboratory animal professionals that focused on care that was excellent, as well as compassionate. From there she set out to encourage cultural change within this niche space of biomedical research with laboratory animal science professionals worldwide that included the need to share their truth with the public. Cindy was the director of the animal care program at Baylor College of Medicine, among the largest in the nation, for over eight years and holds critical roles in the laboratory animal science field as Chair of Americans for Medical Progress (AMP), President of the Texas Society for Biomedical Research (TSBR), and Director of Public Outreach for the National Animal Interest Alliance (NAIA). Her advocacy efforts also including a term as president for the American Association for Laboratory Animal Science (AALAS), as well as the Laboratory Animal Welfare Training Exchange (LAWTE). We honor all of those healthcare and laboratory animal caregivers putting their lives on the line for our health and safety during this worldwide crisis. We also honor the animals who are the real heroes in this story and who represent our biomedical future. To learn more about the field of laboratory animal science, you can go to this AALAS website: https://care.aalas.org/ On the role of animals in research, you can learn more at the Americans for Medical Progress websitehere: https://www.amprogress.org/animalresearch/faqs/ here: https://www.amprogress.org/love-care-progress-video/ and here: https://www.comeseeourworld.org/ For more information on Dr. Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, we recommend you follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PeterHotez?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor The source our of audio clip from Dr. Anthony Fauci was found here; https://fbresearch.org/covid-19-resources-page/ Thank you for supporting Legal Drugs Podcast! If you would like to become a patron, join us at patreon.com/legaldrugspodcast to make a monthly pledge.