Peter Egan Interview with Dr Andre Menache on Animal Testing
On 17 May 2025, AIA Chair Dr Andre Menache wrote to Wes Streeting MP, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, concerning the policies of the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). The letter is reproduced below. A response was received from the MHRA’s Interim Executive Director of Innovation and Compliance, Mr James Pound on 11 June 2025, also reproduced below.
Our view is that the MRHA’s response is unsatisfactory. A different approach needs to be found for meaningful change to happen. One approach is to find a way to put political pressure on the MHRA to fulfil its mission of providing safe and effective drugs to the public using the best available science, which is currently not the case. The Q&A video (above) by Peter Egan provides some pointers. Here is the link to the article quoted in the video. Although the author does not advocate the immediate end to all animal testing, the following sentence is key: “A case example—drug-induced liver injury (DILI)—is examined to highlight where new approach methodologies (NAMs) can offer immediate gains in safety prediction.”
AIA Letter to Wes Streeting MP
Subject: Replacing animal tests with 21st century technology
Date: 17 May 2025
Dear Wes Streeting MP,
I am contacting you on behalf of the faith-based group, Animal Interfaith Alliance, in your role as Secretary of State for Health and Social Care and the role of your Department in overseeing the activities and policies of the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), currently chaired by Professor Anthony Harnden.
The UK government recently announced a £400 million public-private collaboration to kickstart economic growth and build an NHS fit for the future.
It seems ironic to invest £400 million to support faster patient access to cutting-edge treatments, while continuing to allow the pharmaceutical industry to use completely out of date and unreliable animal tests as the backbone of preclinical studies.
According to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), out of ten drugs that successfully pass animal tests, nine will fail during clinical trials, either as a result of adverse reactions not seen in the animals or else due to lack of efficacy in humans. No other comparable industry would tolerate such a failure rate and yet the Government and the MHRA continue to accept animal testing as the « gold standard » despite the availability of modern technologies that far surpass animal tests in terms of reliability and relevance to human health.
As one example, the human ‘liver on a chip’ is far more reliable than animal tests at detecting drug induced liver injury (DILI for short) of prescription drugs. This is hugely significant because the ‘liver on a chip’ will prevent dangerous drugs from ever reaching clinical trials, whereas animal testing is notoriously unreliable at detecting and predicting DILI.
Not only is DILI the leading cause of prescription drug withdrawal from the market, but such liver damage can result in a patient requiring a liver transplant. A single liver transplant will cost the NHS around £ 121 000. This represents a huge economic burden on the NHS, in addition to avoidable human suffering.
Clinical trials must no longer be linked to results obtained from animal tests in the 21st century. Human based test methods, such as « liver on a chip » should be incorporated into the preclinical test phase without delay. Anything less could constitute a dereliction of patient and consumer safety.
We ask the government to implement without delay these and similar human based test methods for the sake of good science, patient safety and animal welfare.
We would be honored if you could make the time to meet with an AIA scientific delegation to allow us to provide evidence based science to back our arguments.
Respectfully yours,
Dr Andre Menache BSc(Hons) BVSc Dip ECAWBM (AWSEL) MRCVS
Chairman Animal Interfaith Alliance (AIA)
cc: Chris Fegan, vice chairman
Barbara Gardner MBE, chief executive Animal Interfaith Alliance – Faiths Working Together for Animals (animal-interfaith-alliance.com)
Animal Interfaith Alliance 