The problem is that the researcher is set up as a terrible straw man, and that in turn makes Adam look a bit like an asshole here, even before getting to animal testing: To start off, she claims that “you can’t [prove things wrong in] science!” … excuse me?! Science is all about [hypotheses] being proved wrong. That’s quite literally its definition.

On we go: “Everyone knows testing on rodents is practically the same as doing actual human trials”. Actually, no competent researcher thinks that. I’ll grant that it’s a fairly common misconception in the media, and one that’s definitely worth addressing.

But it’s disingenuous and counter-productive to do this by creating other misconceptions — namely about what science is (see above), and that scientists are somehow oblivious to the (very obvious!) deficiencies of animal testing. That doesn’t mean that mouse model research is useless — far from it (unfortunately). It’s a crucial first step in a lot of biological and medical research.

To be sure, Dr Raza — as an expert — makes excellent points! But so does the FDA when it mandates animal trials before human trials: Adam points to an example where a drug went to human trials and almost killed the patients even though it was safe in mice. OK. Now imagine how often that would happen if we didn’t have preliminary mouse studies.

That said, all (!) animal research scientists I know support stronger regulations on mouse research. And, although I can’t speak for the US, the regulations are already a lot stricter in the UK and Germany than claimed in Adam’s video.