Our Responsibility to Animals in Drug Development

Medicines created by Genzyme make a major positive difference in the lives of people with a wide range of serious, even life-threatening conditions. Genzyme develops, manufactures and markets treatments for four genetic disorders - Gaucher, Fabry, Pompe and MPS I diseases - as well as treatments for osteoarthritis, renal disease, cancer, and organ transplantation. We are advancing new breakthrough treatments for people with heart disease, immune-mediated diseases and other serious conditions.

None of these advances would be possible without the use of animals, which play a vital part in finding, developing, and producing all new human medicines. By law, human medicines must first be tested for safety in animals before they are tested for safety and efficacy in humans. Laws in the United States, Europe, and Japan not only require this testing, they also set strict standards that govern the way this work is performed.

Genzyme and the companies we work with to develop and produce new medicines view our use of animals as a privilege, not a right. We are guided in this work by three overarching goals: to reduce the number of animals used, to replace animal experiments with alternatives wherever possible, and to refine all procedures in order to avoid discomfort.

We operate in full compliance with the letter and the spirit of all applicable laws and guidelines related to research conduct, including the US Animal Welfare Act, the Health Research Extension Act, the National Institutes of Health's guide to the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals, and relevant European guidelines. Our research facilities are fully accredited by the American Association for the Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care and its international equivalents, and all studies are reviewed, approved, and monitored by an Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee.

Genzyme makes every effort to avoid or minimize any pain and distress to animals, and to ensure that all standards of care are met or exceeded. We know that good animal care is vital to good science, and that it directly contributes to our ability to bring new hope to patients with serious diseases.

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