HC Deb 04 June 1981 vol 5 cc401-2W
Mr. Body

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services to what extent human placenta may be used satisfactorily in research as a substitute for live animals.

Sir George Young

The main Government-funded body carrying out research in this field is the Medical Research Council. I understand that the use of laboratory animals for research into placental function is being increasingly replaced by use of the human placenta. In other areas of biomedical research, however, there remain questions for which neither the human placenta nor tissue culture techniques are applicable and which are likely to be answered only by experimental work involving the use of animals.