Tell Drugmaker Novartis to Ban Near-Drowning Test on Animals

The forced swim test is a widely used experiment that's as cruel as it is worthless. In this test, experimenters put mice, rats, guinea pigs, hamsters, or gerbils in inescapable containers filled with water. The panicked animals try to escape by attempting to climb up the sides of the beakers or even diving underwater in search of an exit. They paddle furiously, desperately trying to keep their heads above water.

The forced swim test was concocted in 1977 by an experimenter named Roger Porsolt, who called it the "behavioral despair test." He found that rats who'd been given human antidepressant drugs would struggle and swim for longer than other rats before starting to float, and he concluded that those who swam for less time were in a state of "despair." But the test has been heavily criticized by many expert scientists who argue that floating is not a sign of despair but rather a positive sign of learning, conserving energy, and adapting to a new environment.

Simply put, the test doesn't accurately predict whether a drug will work as a human antidepressant. It yields positive results for compounds that aren't prescribed as human antidepressants, such as caffeine, and negative results for compounds that are. Importantly, antidepressant compounds that might work in humans may be abandoned based on the results of this worthless test.

Pharmaceutical giant Novartis has subjected more than 1,400 animals to the cruel forced swim test—as documented in 14 published papers over the past 22 years, despite the fact that it’s not required to develop new drugs and has even been discouraged by regulatory scientists.

PETA scientists identified six compounds that the company tested on these animals and found that none of them is currently approved to treat human depression. In fact, none of them even made it to human clinical trials.

After hearing from PETA, at least 18 companies, including many of the world’s top pharmaceutical companies, such as Johnson & Johnson, Bayer, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, and Bristol Myers Squibb, have said they will no longer conduct or fund this cruel test!

Read how other countries have restricted the use of the forced swim test:

• Scientists and regulators from the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency published a paper concluding that the forced swim test could not predict the efficacy of potential new antidepressant drugs and discouraged applicants from submitting forced swim test data in their regulatory applications.
• The U.K. Home Office has placed restrictions on how the forced swim test can be used and has set its intention to completely eliminate the use of the test in the U.K.
• The forced swim test is now illegal in New South Wales, Australia, and the country’s leading funders have placed restrictions on its use in funded projects.
• Regulators and government officials in the European Union and New Zealand have also criticized the test.

For additional information about the forced swim test, please see this report.

The bottom line: The forced swim test is bad science. These experiments do nothing more than terrify animals and delay the development of new, effective treatments that are so desperately needed.

Please tell pharmaceutical giant Novartis to ban this cruel and worthless test.

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