animal trials

SWIMSA ADVOCATING FOR HUMAN AND ANIMAL TRIALS

Text: Marc Reynaud-de la Jara | Liaison Officer to the VSS/UNES (LO-VSS/UNES)

In March 2022, Switzerland rejected an initiative aiming to forbid animal and human trials. swimsa was pleased with the result as it had officially positioned itself against the initiative. The text would have introduced a complete ban on the use of animals for research purposes. Just as worrying for swimsa: no so called “human testing” would be allowed either, a deadly hit for clinical research. No new therapies could be developed using these methods, and all new drugs imported would be required to respect these same development standards. It was immediately clear to universities and research centres that the initiative would be a disaster for research, but swimsa also identified specific concerns for medical students in the initiative.

The effective ban on clinical research meant that Swiss university hospitals would lose their global status, earnt at least partly through the quality of their research. These world-leading institutions hugely benefit Swiss medical students, keeping us close to the latest medical care and research, and even allowing many to take part during our master thesis. In addition, the ban on virtually all new drugs meant we, right at the start of our medical careers, would witness decades of gradually worsening therapy availability for Swiss patients in international comparison. We couldn’t see ourselves denying our future patients life-saving drugs available just across the border. It was important for swimsa to bring our perspective of medical students in the campaign against the initiative. The issue of the initiative was first discussed in early autumn 2021 at the Swiss Student’s Union (VSS in German or UNES in French), the umbrella organisation for most Swiss student associations, who did not finally issue an official position on the initiative. This meant that swimsa couldn’t rely on the political expertise of the VSS board to defend students on this matter and had to take it on its own hands. Not yet entirely sure about the best course of action, swimsa internals began drawing up a statement on the initiative.

The priority at that stage was making sure the statement represented as many medical students as possible. This entailed multiple consultations, modifications, translations, an approval vote from our Executive Board and finally a two week long referendum among our members, the final stage of validation. Before we finished our statement, we learnt through the VSS that swissuniversities wanted a student organisation to support them in the campaign against the initiative. Since the VSS couldn’t fulfil that role, swimsa was the logical partner. It became an additional motivation to finalise the statement before the campaign started.

Our two swimsa Internals at the press conference

After weeks of anticipation, all people involved were proud of the text swimsa officialised and posted on its website in early January 2022, opening the door to the cooperation with swissuniversities. Two swimsa internals, Kate Gurevich (President of swimsa for the term 21/22) and Marc Reynaud-de la Jara (LO-VSS for the term 21/22) were then invited to participate in a Press Conference organised by swissuniversities and other major scientific and health institutions like the ETH board or unimedsuisse as part of the campaign.

It was great to make swimsa’s voice heard in front of many important players in Switzerland’s research, higher education and public health landscape as well as journalists. Additionally, swissuniversities quoted swimsa on its webpage dedicated to the arguments against the initiative. During the press conference we gave concrete examples of how the consequences of the initiative would go beyond direct research and harm many medical students. Unfortunately, the online format didn’t allow for much discussion and few journalists asked questions. Several articles were published following this event, echoing the arguments that were developed during it. We do hope swimsa’s next press conference will be held in-person and give us the opportunity to have more interactions with the other participants and journalists.

Throughout this process, swimsa gained yet more experience we will put to good use the next time we will advocate in the interest of medical students. On that note, don’t hesitate to contact swimsa if you want to be part of the next advocacy project!