The incident is due to the excessive protection of monkeys

2007/03/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Farmakologia
• Medikuntza

Last year there was a serious accident at the British hospital Northwick Park. An animal-tested drug was tested with volunteers and six of them were at risk of death by unexpected drug reaction.

Now, researcher Marelli-Berg of Imperial College London has unveiled a theory about which the unexpected reaction arose. In his opinion, the key may be the monkeys used in experiments.

The compound being tested is called TGN1412. It acts on the immune system. Researchers wanted to activate some immune system cells to treat diseases such as arthritis.

However, it caused a disproportionate reaction in people. Specifically, it promoted the response of the immune system's T-auxiliary cells that launched other immune system mechanisms. As the reaction was so hard, all the organs began to fail.

Why didn't that happen to the monkeys? Researcher Marrelli-Berg believes that laboratory monkeys are protected from infections, since the place is almost sterile and therefore do not have many auxiliary T cells. Consequently, TGN1412 provoked a slight reaction.

However, not all experts agree with the theory. There are those who think that monkeys are not so clean, even in the laboratory, and their immune system may not be the same as people and that there are other reactions, in this case lower. To prevent this from happening again, before trying it with volunteers they propose to try it in the cultures of human cells.