Ethics
Ethical questions have been raised regarding the blood collection process with special emphasis on any potential discomfort caused to the fetus. Respected scientific investigation has shown that the loss of blood circulation in the dam (mother animal) results in death within seconds of slaughter and that the fetus will be dead within a few minutes of the slaughter of the dam due to oxygen deprivation. In comparison, fetal bovine blood is collected from the bovine fetus only after the pregnant uterus has been removed from the slaughtered cow which, in a typical commercial slaughterhouse, means a delay of around 20 minutes from the time of slaughter. The time between maternal death and the start of fetal blood harvesting is relatively long and therefore means that there is minimal possibility of brain activity in the fetus at the time of blood harvesting and hence minimal possibility of discomfort. Of course, it is important to balance the ethical concerns surrounding the welfare of the donor animal against the highly significant benefits that the use of fetal bovine serum brings to human and animal health.
Read more about this topic: Fetal Bovine Serum
Famous quotes containing the word ethics:
“Indeed the involuntary character of psychiatric treatment is at odds with the spirit and ethics of medicine itself.”
—Kate Millett (b. 1934)
“The vanity of the sciences. Physical science will not console me for the ignorance of morality in the time of affliction. But the science of ethics will always console me for the ignorance of the physical sciences.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)
“Ethics and religion differ herein; that the one is the system of human duties commencing from man; the other, from God. Religion includes the personality of God; Ethics does not.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)