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I would rather die than accept this.

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While I wouldn't want any one to suffer needlessly, I can see all kinds of ethical issues.

If it were possible for people to grow organs it would be less of a problem, as we have frreedom of choice. I think I need to think carefully about the issues surrouding this as it would upset some folks and I am not out to do that.
 
A very delicate subject. lots of ethical issues, as you say Caroline, no-one knows what they'd do, I'm sure, until it was them facing life or death. especially, I'm thinking, if it were your child who was suffering.
 
As I eat meat, ethically raised & slaughtered, whenever I have control, and try to avoid eating meat when there is any doubt, and am involved in raising cattle and sheep which also act as "grassland management agents", it's harder for me to argue against using pigs to produce organs, as they are used to produce meat.

However, I belive strongly that no-one should be forced to work with stem-cell-organ-pigs or implanting and no-one should be foreced to accept such an organ. However, healthcare workers often have to look after people in situations where they might not feel comfortable. Even the 1967 Abortion Act only gave healthcare workers the right to opt out of direct involvement in terminations of pregnancy, not in the care of a woman before or after.

Personally, I'm on the Organ Donor Register, as are all my immediate family and my partner, and my Mum, especially, is very insistent that she wants me to represent her views so as many of her organs as possible are used. A very good friend of mine developed chronic myeloid leukaemia at a very young age, and fortunately, an unrelated bone marrow donor was found, so she is completely free of the condition, and doesn't even need to take anti-rejection drugs - only happens with bone marrow transplants.
 
Defo issues surrounding this, but I wouldn't say the idea was totally out there............pigs are there for meat, its sad but true, we also got insulin from them not that long ago...........and still do I think...

As technology advances the need for ideas like this will diminish, but in the mean time it may help folk out........
 
difficult as it is to accept it isn't that long ago that many of us wouldn't have survived without animal insulin.......
 
Tricky one this!

Just wondering if you are on Insulin? How would you feel if or when you are told that is the only way to go?

I really don't know which way I would go and at the end of the day I dont think anyone really knows until the time comes! It is a bit like committing murder, I like to think it is something I would never do, but in reality if push came to shove and depending on circumstances then you never know 😱

Hope I've not upset anyone,

take care all

Shirl
 
Like many others, I survived for many years on porcine insulin, which the pigs didn't have any choice in. I also eat meat.

There would always be a choice for the patient to accept organs from this source or not. We are lucky that we have that choice.

Even humalog is produced from GM bacteria. It could easily be labelled as a Frankenstein product by the tabloids.

But, as has been said, if it were my child suffering, I wouldn't think twice.🙂

But well done for sticking to your own moral viewpoint.

Rob
 
I always worked on the premise that the pigs my insulin came from would have been slaughtered anyway for chops etc had the Wellcome Foundation not have wanted to make use of one of their organs and I really have no idea how it was - or is, by Wockhardt now - actually extracted. Or are the pigs slaughtered in the normal manner of butchery before owt gets done? - clueless I am.

I love pigs - such sociable animals, and piglets are a complete delight - but the fact is they are the nearest animal to us in terms of organs; even the taste of our flesh - so it is alleged the cannibals used to say. ("Long Pigs")

If Banting and Best and the Scottish bloke hadn't created diabetic dogs a 100 years ago, a lot of us on this forum would have been dead a very, very long time ago. I can hardly criticise them for doing that even though knowing what I felt like pre-diagnosis, it can't have been a happy time for the poor beasts. Thank you, doggies and piggies.

What I can't abide is deliberate out and out CRUELTY to any animal, humans included, for absolutely no sane reason at all, scientific or otherwise.
 
Yes, I believe that the insulin was sourced from the slaughterhouses. The main problem was that it was difficult and expensive to purify so the current analogue insulins are much easier to produce in a consistent strength. Don't forget the fish sperm that modified the porcine and bovine insulin so that it acted less quickly.

I'm a big pig fan too, always wanted a three sow unit for my back garden, regular attendee at the Annual Pig and Poultry Show, and subscriber ti International Pig Topics magazine! 🙂

I've written various poems pertaining to 'the old days' and pigs/fish etc.:

Diabetic Days of Yore:
http://diabetespoetry.blogspot.com/2010/07/diabetic-days-of-yore.html

Fish sperm:
http://diabetespoetry.blogspot.com/2009/11/tales-of-hans-christian-hagedorn.html

Pig sushi:
http://diabetespoetry.blogspot.com/2010/11/pig-sushi.html

and of course the infamous Cornish Insulin episode from Casualty:
http://diabetespoetry.blogspot.com/2010/03/cornish-clotted-insulin.html

:D

You might be interested in the Dr Hadwen Trust that promotes non-animal testing research:

http://www.drhadwentrust.org/
 
I can't say I really agree with this. But on the other hand we would all be dead if it weren't for the death of the dog they killed in the 20s by taking its pancreas out and discovering it needed insulin to live. Poor dog!

I personally would find it very hard to take an organ grown inside a pig that had to die for me. :(
 
Given the choice between life and death I would certainly take a organ by any means possible to further my life, no one can honestly say that they would refuse a organ until the circumstances arise, I have seen people die a untimely death and it isn't very pleasant.
 
Northerner said:
Yes, I believe that the insulin was sourced from the slaughterhouses. The main problem was that it was difficult and expensive to purify so the current analogue insulins are much easier to produce in a consistent strength. Don't forget the fish sperm that modified the porcine and bovine insulin so that it acted less quickly.

I'm a big pig fan too, always wanted a three sow unit for my back garden, regular attendee at the Annual Pig and Poultry Show, and subscriber ti International Pig Topics magazine! 🙂

I've written various poems pertaining to 'the old days' and pigs/fish etc.:

Diabetic Days of Yore:
http://diabetespoetry.blogspot.com/2010/07/diabetic-days-of-yore.html

Fish sperm:
http://diabetespoetry.blogspot.com/2009/11/tales-of-hans-christian-hagedorn.html

Pig sushi:
http://diabetespoetry.blogspot.com/2010/11/pig-sushi.html

and of course the infamous Cornish Insulin episode from Casualty:
http://diabetespoetry.blogspot.com/2010/03/cornish-clotted-insulin.html

:D

You might be interested in the Dr Hadwen Trust that promotes non-animal testing research:

http://www.drhadwentrust.org/
Click to expand...

Alan, you crack me up! I love these, especially the clotted cream statin!! yum! lol.
I wonder where the guy realised the sperm from the trout worked with the fast acting inslulin, makes you think. (I'm glad he did tho')
 
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