Lucky Pet Dogs Receive Experimental Cancer Treatments Before Their Humans
Animal rights activists, take note: when it comes to experimental cancer treatments, American pet dogs are now in line in front of humans, participating in trials that in several cases have destroyed cancers completely. Dogs experience cancer in ways similar to humans, making them preferable research subjects to lab rats and mice, whose experimental settings are too regimented to reflect a human reaction to cancers. Those human-like reactions have granted dying dogs access to treatments ahead of dying humans in some cases, allaying some ethical fears while stirring up others. Like humans, dogs suffer from various cancers that spread to form secondaries and grow resistant to drugs over time. Dogs can also relapse just as humans do, giving researchers a much better picture of how effective a drug can be at destroying a particular cancer or sending it into remission. These similarities make dogs ideal candidates...