CIVIS Bulletin Nr 1, 1983  (page nine)

 

 

From Among More Than a Thousand Medical Opinions 1900 - 1980

 

"In spite of their scientific value, animal tests of medications have remained totally fruitless in the treatment of diseases, and the practicing physician hasn't learned anything useful for his patients that he didn't know fifty years ago". (Prof Dr. Felix von Niemeyer, Germany's most respected medical authority at the turn of the century, in his manual Handbuch der praktischen Medizin)

 

"The discovery of anaesthetics owes nothing to experiments on animals." (Report of the Royal Commission on Vivisection, 1912)

 

"I have never known a single good surgeon who had learned anything from vivisection." (Dr Abel Desjardins, president of the Society of Surgeons of Paris, foremost surgeon of his time in France and professor of surgery at the Sorbonne)

 

"My own conviction is that the study of human physiology by way of experiments on animals is the most grotesque and fantastic error ever committed in the whole range of human intellectual activity." (Dr. G.F. Walker, Medical World, Dec. 8, 1933.)

 

"The wasted time and energy over the modern lines of cancer research are greatly to be deplored. We are sorry to think that so many able research workers are being tricked into believing that the cause and cure of cancer will be discovered by animal experiments." (Medical Times, Jan 1936)

 

"As the years pass, cancer seems to be on the increase. The search for the cause has up till now met with a very poor result, largely owing to the fact that cancer research has been and is being conducted on laboratory animals." (Medical Review, Feb 1951)

 

"The folly of founding the actions of drugs on animal experiments cannot be over emphasized." (Editorial, Medical Review, Sept 1953)

 

"No experimental worker can provide a single fact about human disease." (Dr D. A Long,, London, from the National Institute for Medical Research, Lancet, Mar 13, 1954)

 

"There really exists no logical basis for translating the results of animals to man." (Dr L  Goldberg, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Quantitative Method in Human Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Pergamon Press, London, 1959)

 

"It is not possible to apply to the human species experimental information derived from inducing cancer in animals." (Dr Kenneth Starr, Honorary Director of the special unit for investigation and treatment of cancer for the New South Wales Cancer Council, Sidney Morning Herald, April 7, 1960)

 

"Thalidomide is not the first nor the last drug to have brought heartbreak where it was meant to bring help. There have been quite a number of other tragedies since Thalidomide went wrong thirteen years ago."  (An editorial in The Economist, London, Jan 6, 1973.)

 

"Modern medicine is a negation of health. It isn't organized to serve human-health, but only itself, as an institution. It makes more people sick than it heals." (Sociologist Ivan IlIich, author of Medical Nemesis, Pantheon Books, New York, 1976)

 

"In praxis all animal experiments are scientifically indefensible, as they lack scientific validity and reliability in regard to humans. They only serve as an alibi for the drug manufacturers, who hope to protect themselves thereby." (Dr H Stiller and Dr M Stiller in Tierversuch und Tierexperimentator, Hirthammer Verlag, Munich, 1976)

 

"Animal experiments should be forbidden everywhere." (Dr Julius Hackenthal, one of the best known German surgeons and author of medical books, in an interview with Die Zeit, Oct 13, 1978)

 

"It is about time that doctors should demand the replacement of animal experiments by other methods." (Dr F Schenk, Schweizeische Aerztezeitung, Nov 29, 1978)

 

"As a cancer specialist engaged in clinical practice, I can't agree with the researchers who believe that results obtained with laboratory animals are applicable to human beings." (Prof Dr Heinz Oeser, in one of the leading German weeklies, Quick, March 15, 1979)

 

"Normally, animal experiments not only fail to contribute to the safety of medications, but they even have the opposite effect." (Prof Dr Kurt Fickentscher of the Pharmacological Institute of the University of Bonn, Germany, in Diagnosen, March 1980)

 

"Our entire medicine today is dominated, practically terrorized, by analytical science, which is insensitive and heartless. Its medical research has nothing at all to do with health. The elimination of symptoms is being misrepresented as a restoration to health, but it has nothing to do with health. On the contrary, it impairs and prevents true healthiness. A child whose fever has been hastily eliminated by administration of antibiotics is sicker than before, becomes susceptible to disease, chronically ill. Analytical science has formed doctors whose mental faculties don't go beyond the 2 x 2 = 4 principle. They are blind to elementary observation, which they disdain as "subjective." This unenlightened attitude is also responsible for the revolting animal experiments, which are a sign of mental inadequacy." (Prof Dr Helmut Mommsen, pediatrist in Frankfurt, Germany, in Civis-Schweiz Aktuell, Zurich, December 1981)

 

REVIEWS OF SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENT

 

First published as a Bantam Book Original in 1978. Reprinted by Civitas Publications, Inc. 1983, and Slingshot Publications, UK, 2004

 

Dr Robert S Mendelsohn, MD, Professor of Preventive Medicine at the University of Illinois (Chicago), Chairman of the Medical Licensing Committee for the State of Illinois, recipient of numerous awards for excellence in medicine and medical instruction, best selling author of Confessions of a Medical Heretic and Malepractice, in his Foreword to the CIVITAS reprint of Slaughter of the Innocent:

 

"Hans Ruesch's magnificent book washes away the thin excuses of doctor-apologists for animal testing. Comprehensively and carefully documented, objective, yet emotionally compelling, it serves as the steel battering ram that can dislodge the cornerstone of Modern Medicine - vivisection. All of us - including future generations - are in his debt."

 

Barry York, in Bowyang Magazine, Sidney University, New South Wales 2006, Australia: "Ruesch provides a refreshing approach to a cause that is overly identified with Hollywood 'beautiful people' and moral philosophers. His impressive knowledge of medical science allows for a conclusiveness sadly lacking in Peter Singer's well-known thesis on Animal Liberation. Singer relied entirely on ethical questions. Ruesch constructs an argument based on ethics but cemented by an exposure of the Western medical system that long ago turned its back on Hippocratic principles. The great strength of Ruesch's thesis is that he places vivisection in the context of a corrupt and money hungry health industry. Animal experimentation is as futile and fraudulent as the industry it services."

 

Publishers Weekly: "This study of vivisection aroused a storm of outrage in Italy, where it was originally published. It could receive the same reaction here, for Ruesch's findings are shocking and deeply disturbing…Ruesch builds a well-documented argument and certainly a controversial one."

 

American Library Association: "Disturbing probe. Ruesch's discussion is forthright and reasoned, but he incorporates ample, painfully explicit evidence from medical and scientific journals to underscore his charges…"

 

Chicago's NAVS Bulletin: "Author Hans Ruesch - one of the most respected names in today's world of science isn't just talking about the slaughter of cats and rats. He's talking about the slaughter of people. Slaughter in the sense that vivisectors have completely blocked off true progress in medical science for more than a century."

Society for Animal Rights, Clarks Summit, PA, Special Report: "Slaughter of the Innocent can well be the book that brings about abolition of vivisection."

 

Vegetarian Times: "Hans Ruesch stands out among the more articulate anti-vivisectionists of our time. His extremely powerful book should be read by anyone who is remotely interested in animal rights and human health."

 

Chicago Tribune: "Medical editor Ruesch builds a strong and formidably documented case against laboratory experiments on animals."

 

AV, the Magazine of the American Anti-Vivisection Society, Philadelphia: "Most books on laboratory animals simply cannot be read by the general public. This one they will not be able to lay down."

 

Our Town, New York's Municipal paper: "Ruesch exposes not only the vivisectors who are pocketing salaries of $54,000 a year, but he is fighting to outlaw vivisection: to make it illegal, like the torture and murder of innocent humans. The fundamental scientific error of all animal experimentation is that through unnatural, arbitrary interference, healthy non-humans are deliberately injured and made sick - the results have nothing in common with a spontaneous disease…In countering this ghoulish, secret, multi-billion fraud, perpetrated in the name of science, Ruesch's original analysis and documentation is a powerful weapon." (Henry Spira)

 

Kalindra News, London: "Not just a book, but a well-timed explosive device. The writer is a one-time editor of medical publications.  He categorically shows that even for practical reasons, leaving out morality, all experiments on animals are useless. This is the first book which combines not only details of unbelievably horrific abuse of animals by pseudo-scientists, but also the rebounding effects on humans from the misleading results of that abuse."

 

Daily Express, London: "It's a view I'd always taken myself - until I read Slaughter of the Innocent. As the first nation to restrict vivisection by law, it's time we looked again at our dubious record." (Peter Grosvenor)

 

Nebelspalter, Zurich: "A tremendous persuasiveness and exceptional competence emanates from this book." (Fritz Bondy)

 

La Suisse, Geneva: "With this book, Hans Ruesch, the novelist, launches a bomb that unfortunately is not fictional. He denounces the crimes of vivisection in terms that for the first time might convince even people who don't care one whit about animals." (Simone Guye

 

Tribune de Geneve, Geneva: "This is the most thorough and appalling indictment that has ever been brought against animal experimentation, but also against traditional medicine and pharmaceutical research."

 

Schweizer IIlustrierte, Zurich: "With his newest book, Hans Ruesch has shocked all of Italy. In the press, on radio and TV, the public is aroused." (Edith Wieland's Report from Rome)

 

La Voix des Betes, Paris: "By his documentation as well as by his fiery, sometimes violent style, Hans Ruesch convinces even the most reticent. His argumentation is so thorough that at the end of the book the partisans of animal experimentation are left without a leg to stand on." (J.J. Barloy)

 

Lyon-Matin, Lyon, France: "The book demonstrates that the claims of vivisection are a monstrous fraud, due to the coalition of an almighty pharmaceutical industry and a certain medicine that has turned its back on Hippocrates."

 

Quick, Munich: "A staggering document."

 

Westermanns Monatshefte, West Germany's leading literary monthly: "Nobody has dared tackling the Science taboo so forcefully before. Henceforth, vivisectionists will have a hard time finding a single argument in favor of animal experimentation."

 

Ferdinando de Leo, professor of surgery at the University of Naples, Italy, and chief surgeon at the Pellegrini Hospital: "The validity of its documentation is the strong point of this book, which should be thoughtfully pondered by all who, for the sake of mankind, have chosen the difficult path of medical study."

 

Pietro Croce, M.D., researcher and chief pathologist at the Hospital L Sacco of Milan, Italy, member of both major American medical associations, author of several medical treatises on tubercolosis, in his book Vivisezione O Scienza - una Scelta: "This fundamental work on vivisection reveals the secrets of the practice, its pecuniary interests, the damage it causes to the progress of medicine, the lies that keep  it going."

 

Stampa Sera, Turin: "A violent and well-documented indictment against vivisection and its erroneous findings…resulting in a manufactory of diseases. An exceptional and courageous book."

 

L'Unita, Rome and Milan: "No wonder that these sorcerers apprentices produce medications that cause cancer."

 

Corriere della Sera, Milan: "A vibrant denunciation of the atrocities committed in the name of science."

 

II Piccolo, Triest: "We can fight against those who use our money and abuse our health for the sake of their careers and pecuniary gain, and we ought to do it quickly."

 

Roma, Naples: "A merciless analysis, 'a vivisection of vivisection,' Fascinating and appalling, horrible and exalting."

 

Epoca, Milan: "This book is a noble battle against the two principal forces in the world, human greed and stupidity."

 

Il Giornale Nuovo, Milan: "The cruelty of vivisectors has no end and no limits…The book's solidity rests on its documentation, on the statements of people who are eminent in the world of science and industry."

 

L' Espresso, Milan: "A violent and well-documented indictment."

 

Il Giornale d'ltalia, Rome: "This pitiless analysis topples idols from their pedestals and dispenses terrific blows. It has the value of revelation."

International Herald Tribune, Paris: "Mr Ruesch's book has so far been published only in Italy, hardly a country known for its concern for animals. The uproar was so intense that even in the agitated period before the Italian elections, a deputy raised the question of vivisection in Parliament." (Mary Blume)

 

Medizinische Wochenzeitung, Switzerland's Medical Journal: "This impressive, shattering work on animal experimentation should prompt us doctors to reappraise this burning, important subject." (Balz Widmer, M.D.)

 

Spotlight (No. 13 of April 1978 of the German language publication of the World Society for the Protection of Animals): "This book is a pitiless, extremely well documented indictment of the major research methods in today's medical science, which the author, and with him an entire row of important physicians and scientists, considers not only inhumane but also unscientific. This publication is a singular medical, sociological and philosophical treatise."

 

REVIEWS OF NAKED EMPRESS (Buchverlag CIVIS, 1982)

 

Mobilise! The newsletter of the New-Zealand Antivivisection Society, Wellington: "Hans Ruesch does it again! In Naked Empress he blows the lid off the health racket."

 

The Vegetarian, Great Britain: "I found this a very disturbing book. Part of my mind is afraid to believe it is true because it shatters so many ideas we have always assumed to be correct."

 

Society for Animal Rights Report, Clarks Summit, PA USA: "The long-awaited follow-up to Slaughter of the Innocent is not more of the same…Naked Empress is at once easier to read than Slaughter, and more disturbing…What one feels is fear and anger at the depth of the intertwining - and up-to-now hidden - economic roots of vivisection. This is a source-book of eye-opening information. Ruesch's main argument is that the public's equation of medical care and health is a lie, established as truth by the medical-pharmaceutical industry's control over the media. In fact, he claims that it is the nature of current medical practice that is responsible for much sickness. As a clinician, I can attest that this is true." (Steven Tiger, PA-C)

 

Vegetarian Times, USA: "Ruesch provides a whole arsenal of ammunition for those who are fighting to eliminate vivisection on humanitarian grounds by documenting reasons why it should be eliminated on medical and scientific grounds."

 

NAVS Journal, Chicago, and AV Magazine, Jenkintown, PA: "Your health - as much as your life - may very well depend on what you learn from this explosive expose on modern medical research and science because it unearths some information that many powerful individuals in America and abroad would prefer to keep buried forever." (Laura A Moretti)

 

Agenda - News magazine of the Animal Rights Network, Westport, Ct.: "Citing animal experiments as alibis for the drug manufacturers, Ruesch documents case after case in which it has been proven that "science", ignoring the results of its own experiments, continues to furnish treatment after treatment, drug after drug, into the unsuspecting, misguided hand of consumers, who later become the victims of fraudulent medical research, better known as the multi billion dollar business of science and sadism."

 

New England Anti-Vivisection Society, Boston, USA: "The author's arguments are compelling. He gives numerous examples (in a style far more readable than his earlier book Slaughter of the Innocent) of fraud and corruption in the medical field. The truths, as reported by the author, are frightening."

 

The National Humanitarian, Phoenix, Arizona: "Warning: The contents of this book may be dangerous to your peace of mind if you depend upon pharmaceutical preparations for your health…This reviewer has read this sequel to Slaughter of the Innocent twice and has given it a permanent place on his shelf of reference books. Hans Ruesch is no ordinary craftsman in the field of literature. He has done a painstaking job of research and has compiled the most serious indictment against the world wide Chemo Medical Syndicate ever before published. This is a valuable book and belongs alongside of Slaughter of the Innocent, the only book to our knowledge that has ever been suppressed in this country."

 

N.B. Not one of Britain's AV societies is carrying these two books on their "recommended reading" list.

Links for this Bulletin Nr 1

 

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