---
title: ""As the demand for horseshoe crab blood in the medical community…"
date: 2020-06-09
source: facebook
type: Archer T. Ships shared a link.
---

# "As the demand for horseshoe crab blood in the medical community…

*June 9, 2020 · Facebook*

::::: {}
::: {}
[https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/05/blood-in-the-water/559229/](https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/05/blood-in-the-water/559229/){target="_blank"}
:::

::: {}
\"As the demand for horseshoe crab blood in the medical community continues to increase due to Covid-19, one might wonder why we are still resorting to such archaic and inhumane practices when a synthetic alternative has been available for a decade and a half\...\
\
May 2018: \"Lonza, for its part, blamed the slow uptake on regulations. In the United States, the FDA tells companies carrying out bacterial-toxin tests to follow the United States Pharmacopeia, a handbook that lays out drug standards. In a 2012 guidance, the FDA said companies could use recombinant factor C, which does not appear in the Pharmacopeia, if they carried out their own validation tests. "The risk is, of course, the FDA may not accept your validation and you can't bring your product to market," says Lonza's spokesperson Katrin Hoeck. "Pharmaceutical companies are risk-averse." It took the industry decades to move from rabbits to LAL, too.\"\
[https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/05/blood-in-the-water/559229/](https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/05/blood-in-the-water/559229/){target="_blank"}
:::
:::::