• "From England: The Committee on the Safety of Medicines Report No. 30 dated December 1990:
  

  'There is often some debate on what constitutes a 'serious reaction' - for this reason we hope the list below will provide guidance to doctors on serious reactions for which we would hope to receive reports...'

  The list is headed sudden death! The report also gives lists of fatalities following several drugs including the leukemia drugs vinblastine and vincristine... and goes on to outline adverse effects of drugs including 'serious and involved hallucinations', 'behavioural disturbances including aggression', 'acute depression leading to suicidal tendencies', ... hundreds of deaths through faulty heart valves... 'heart failure', 'abortion', 'cataracts', 'hearing loss', and so on. Worst of all the Committee for the Safety of Medicines says that doctors are aware of many more adverse drug reactions that are NOT reported..."

The Committee for the Safety of Medicines advises the Government on the granting of licences to new drugs. Prof. Bill Inman, who heads the Drug Safety Research Unit at Southampton University is critical of this body:

"The Committee relies heavily on the drug companies for safety information and most of its members are linked to the industry as consultants or receivers of research grants. In a move to make the Committee independent - that is without links with the industry... there would be no-one to sit on the Committee..."
(Says Prof. Inman.)

• "...From Britain's Medicine in Society, Vol. 7 1981: (Dr Vernon Coleman.)
  

  'Drug induced illness has become a public health menace of major and alarming proportions, producing more deaths annually than are caused by cancer and is among the top cause of hospital admission.'

• From France, Dr Bon De Brouwer noted researcher says: (Ruesch Foundation Report).
  

  'The pharmaceutical industry controls government by their contributions to political campaigns. We are all at the mercy of politicians and the pharmaceutical industry.'

• From Australia, Brewster Ashley, Director of the Therapeutic Goods Administration Drug Evaluation Branch (Aust.) in Auckland Star 7 March 1991, page 7, under World News:
  

  'We have to remember that the main aim of pharmaceutical companies is not to make drugs for the good of mankind, but to make profits for their shareholders.'

Mr Chairman it is confirmed in this letter, dated 28 February 1991, from the Associate Minister of Health that:

'The cost to the New Zealand Government for pharmaceuticals it subsidises is 578 million dollars per year.'

Last week on Morning Report the Minister of Health announced:

'We can no longer afford a health service.'

Mr Chairman, if we want to be kind we call vivisection an error, if we want to be forthright we call it a fraud, but if we want to be truthful we call it a deliberate conspiracy. A conspiracy so grotesque that it is incomprehensible to anyone in their right minds. But after this Hearing, politicians will no longer be able to plead ignorance as a reason for not abolishing vivisection in New Zealand.

Medical professionals for the abolition of vivisection are organised. They are determined and dedicated leaders in their various fields of medicine and veterinary practice. Currently counted in their thousands they will soon be counted in their hundreds of thousands. High-ranking medics are providing proof that vivisection is scientific fraud, and the lay-people in the new abolitionist movement, in possession of the facts, organise their marches, hold their rallies and petition their governments. But in New Zealand, the unsavoury and disgraceful preliminaries which preceded this Hearing, coupled with the fact that we are sceptical, to say the least, about the petitions system, indicated that the days of marches, rallies, petitions and other lawful approaches may be over. We have exhausted every legitimate means of bringing this issue to political attention.

Like our last Petition to abolish the Lethal Dose 50 Test, we are fearful that this Hearing will also be a sham! Five years ago, the petition of the NZ Anti-Vivisection Society seeking abolition of the Lethal Dose 50 Test was referred from Select Committee to the Government with a Recommendation for Favourable Consideration.

The Government however did not outlaw the LD50 Test but placed it under the administration of newly-formed ethics committees. Which means under the administration of the vivisectionist community. This reveals the farce of the petitions system!

Five years, and one hundred and fifty million animals, and innumerable human health tragedies later, the Lethal Dose 50 Test is being formally discontinued and dismantled by the international chemical/medical regulatory authorities on the grounds that it is inconclusive!

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