1282 
THE USE OF ANIMALS IN MEDICAL RESEARCH AND EXPERIMENTATION 
research is deeply rooted in almost every aspect 
of clinical medicine. Next I would like to have 
Dr. Julius Cass give us the views of the Vet- 
erans' Administration in this important area. 
Dr. Julius Cass : I too come from an affected 
agency. I bring no funds or suggest how you 
might get them. The VA, like all other govern- 
mental agencies, is affected by this law in that 
they themselves must do their own policing and 
be responsible for following it. We meet the 
NIH policy, although there is a long-standing 
ruling that one governmental agency does not 
have any responsibility for another, in that 
many of our investigators in VA are NIH 
grantees who are associated with medical 
schools and other research institutions. In that 
way, Dr. Conner, the policy of NIH reaches into 
the Veterans' Administration. 
I would like to present a few thoughts on the 
fact that the animal research has been badly 
split down the middle. It has two components 
now that don't even speak to one another and 
are budgeted in two entirely different ways, 
and these methods are such that many times 
one or the other of these aspects can fall be- 
tween the cracks because one doesn't know what 
the other is doing. 
Let me show a case in point. Research is de- 
fined as an investigator, his concept as de- 
signed in his experiment, the procedures that 
he selects, and the subject which he uses to 
study. I don't think I'd get any arguments on 
that definition of research. The concept, the 
design of the study, the procedures selected, and 
the subject studied. There are only different 
media that we can do our studies in : human 
subjects, animal subjects, the lower animals, 
biological materials from either of these, and 
one which we don't relate to a great deal, but 
does occur, plant subjects. These are the sub- 
jects of our study. 
In the VA we have clinical research and 
facilities. We have laboratory research and 
facilities where the biological materials and 
inanimate materials are studied, and we have 
animal research and facilities. Of these three — 
clinical, where human subjects are used, the 
animal subjects in animal research and facili- 
ties, and the laboratory research and facilities, 
where biological materials are studied, only 
one is split up into two units, animal research 
and facilities. You'll find the animal subjects of 
research as a supply object. We are budgeted 
differently, from different sources, administra- 
tively, or through a university in a fund that 
many times has nothing to do with research as 
we know it. Animal research facilities have no 
reason to exist in an institution except as gen- 
erated by the research program. Otherwise, it's 
an absolute luxury with no purpose. 
The laws that we have had enacted address 
themselves to the humane aspects of animal 
handling. The word "care" as originally de- 
veloped was totally associated with the word 
"humane." The word "humane" has been 
dropped, the word "care" exists and we've 
adopted it. Yet involved people that developed 
this had only one thing in mind, and that is 
the humane care of laboratory animals. The 
concept does not address itself to scientific 
validity of handling, manipulating, monitoring, 
and measuring which includes humane handling 
and care. 
The Guidelines that the National Research 
Council developed through the Institute of 
Laboratory Animal Resources Committee and 
which was published by the National Institutes 
of Health, Public Health Service go beyond hu- 
mane care. They include some of the aspects of 
scientific validity, and we should recognize that. 
In complying with the USDA law (and I must 
congratulate the efforts of the USDA under 
very trying conditions), they have come in to 
the VA at our request in one instance and have 
been contacted in many instances at the request 
of our own investigators in the field to walk a 
path that is most difficult, not only from the 
em.otional standpoint, but from trying to find 
fact and put some basis under these humane 
laws. 
But they say, "We stop where Congress has 
indicated by intent and content of the law that 
we may regulate," and they do not go beyond 
this point, even though as veterinary medical 
people learning more about the field of labora- 
tory animal medicine, science and technology, 
they recognize that there are areas apart from 
the scientifically valid part of our work where 
they could contribute, but they don't step be- 
yond the law. That is why they will not relate 
