Man Vivisected

J. B. S. Haldane, lecturer in biochemistry at Cambridge University, England, last week let be known the name of the man upon whom Professor Fraser of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, London, recently performed an experiment that required vivisection. Viscount Haldane, uncle of J. B. S. Haldane, had described the operation in the House of Lords when the topic of vivisection happened to come before that moribund body.

Professor Fraser and other scientists wished to know what effect acidosis had on the blood. The information is important for the diagnosis and treatment of diabetes, for example.

Normally Professor Fraser would have sought a dog for this experiment. But in London recently anti-vivisectionists have been active. Professor Fraser therefore did not dare use a dog, especially because conditions of his experiment forbade his chloroforming the animal. Some laboratory assistant might babble.

So he asked for a man bold enough to take the requisite drugs and, later, to have an artery of his thigh bled. The intrepid man upon whom the experiment was performed was J. B. S. Haldane.