
Biomedical companies bleed 500k horseshoe crabs a year - kharms
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/a26038/the-blood-of-the-crab/
======
AcerbicZero
I found a few interesting facts during the first 10 minutes or so of googling
this:

1\. Bled crabs die at higher than reported rates (Closer to 20%-25% than the
reported ~10%-15%)

2\. Bled crabs are back at full blood capacity in a week, and usually fully
functional within 2-3 months.

3\. This crab blood is seriously important to modern medicine (duh?, but hey
its nice to have confirmation)

4\. Population numbers are all guesses, and I couldn't find a number which I'd
be willing to bet on. Low number was ~600k (mature crabs) high number was
several million.

5\. Losing blood and being thrown back into the ocean is an order of magnitude
better than being chopped up and used as bait.

6\. A huge number of these crabs get chopped up and used as bait. They're
valued at ~$2 each, as bait :(

7\. These crabs lay upwards of 50k eggs per season, per female. A specific
bird, the Red Knot, which doesn't seem to doesn't have magic medicinally
valuable blood shows up and treats the eggs like an all you can eat buffet.

8\. The Red Knot population has been on the rebound, thanks to conservation
efforts revolving around the horseshoe crab, and the expanded food supply that
offers.

Enough other people have gone over the various moral issues with this, and I
don't think I'd be able to add much there. To me, the whole situation seems
trivial to solve, via enhanced conservation efforts, and heavily reduced bait
harvesting. Probably wouldn't hurt to make a few Red Knot omelettes too. Bleed
+ Release > Bait harvest/baby crab genocide via bird.

------
mikepurvis
The idea that this isn't "fishing" because they're tossed back afterward is
really beyond me. Seems about equivalent to chopping the fin off a shark and
then dumping what remains into the water to bleed out and die.

With proper regulation, it seems possible this could be done somewhat
humanely— particularly if the draw from any one crab was strictly limited, and
their time out of water was also very limited. Eg, if the facilities were
right on board the boat, so it would out and back in all within in the span of
a few hours.

~~~
tree_of_item
> The idea that this isn't "fishing" because they're tossed back afterward is
> really beyond me. Seems about equivalent to chopping the fin off a shark and
> then dumping what remains into the water to bleed out and die.

I guess I'm missing something, how is this in any way comparable to that?
They're not cutting off a piece of the crab, just drawing some blood and
putting them back. Why would they bleed out and die? Do humans bleed out and
die after drawing blood?

~~~
ceejayoz
> Do humans bleed out and die after drawing blood?

If you take a third of it, then throw them in the woods to fend for
themselves, some definitely will.

~~~
goldenkey
Almost all will die without medical care.

Class III Hemorrhage involves loss of 30-40% of circulating blood volume. The
patient's blood pressure drops, the heart rate increases, peripheral
hypoperfusion (shock), such as capillary refill worsens, and the mental status
worsens. Fluid resuscitation with crystalloid and blood transfusion are
usually necessary.

------
oftenwrong
>While several companies have come up with synthetic alternatives for
detecting the presence of endotoxins in vaccines, medicine, and medical
instruments, LAL is still the only test that has received FDA approval.

I wish they would have elaborated on this. Are the alternatives known to be
inferior at this time, or are they promising, but stuck in the long,
complicated approval process?

~~~
hammock
The common sense answer is that an alternative which was inferior would never
be developed to the point of submission for FDA approval, as it would not be
viable to take to market.

~~~
logicallee
But the article says the crab blood costs $14,000 per quart - if something
works "well enough" and can be made synthetically, certainly it could be used
in some cases due to the cost alone.

For example, consider if there is a simple case where the test is _not_
administered at all today in some cases, due to the cost. (Use your
imagination.) In that case "good enough" to quickly administer for a quick
read, might well be a very low threshold indeed! Who says "good enough to
administer" must be "the best level in existence"?

~~~
digitalzombie
> "well enough"

This is the medical field. There is no well enough.

Even modeling for cancer detection we do 95% and medical device they do 99%
confidence interval IIRC. And with model, we choose sensitivity over
specificity. We rather accidentally diagnosed them with cancer over
accidentally say they don't have cancer when they do.

Also FDA might have a bar what well enough is, and it could high enough that
other companies cannot pass it.

~~~
logicallee
What makes you think I thought "good enough" means 55% or 60% efficient, or
whatever you object to? Good enough might mean 99% of the time.

You said it yourself!

>Even modeling for cancer detection we do 95% and medical device they do 99%
confidence interval IIRC

So, in these applications, 95% and 99% respectively is the meaning of good
enough.

So to put these in crab terms: maybe the crabs do it at 99.99% (3.89 sigma)
and the synthetic they want to push through is only 99%, only 2.5 sigma.

So I am saying 99% can be good enough in some contexts - just as you've said.

Especially if it costs thousands to do it a la crab.

It doesn't have to be _better_ than the crabs' blood to be _good enough._

------
matthewmarkus
There is a great little startup in the EU working to biosynthesize LAL:

[http://sothicbio.science/](http://sothicbio.science/)

It's a RebelBio (née IndieBio EU) company.

~~~
ajryan
Will the synthetic enzyme be a direct substitute in the standard LAL enzyme
chain? Or will it be an alternative reaction like Lonza's PyroGene?

------
drzaiusapelord
>Biomedical/pharmaceutical companies are reluctant to devote time and
resources to qualify an alternative method as they are concerned that
regulators will not accept the alternative method. However, the pharmacopeia
publications include chapters that directly address what is needed to qualify
an alternative method so that it will be acceptable by regulators.

Classic chicken and egg problem here. These companies don't want to invest in
the lengthy regulatory approval process because they aren't sure they'll pass
so progress on these alternative methods gets stalled, thus ensuring they look
sub-optimal on paper, so the perceived risk level is probably higher than it
should be.

Considering there are two alternatives here, one involving synthetically
cloning DNA and the other simply using human blood, I can probably see why
industry is slow to move off the crab blood process. The former is most likely
much more expensive and patent encumbered, while the later involves harvesting
humans instead of crabs. Human blood is needed for transfusions and has a high
demand, so it makes sense to just use animal blood for endotoxin testing.

[1][http://www.horseshoecrab.org/med/alternatives.html](http://www.horseshoecrab.org/med/alternatives.html)

~~~
beaconstudios
could the blood not be taken from the dead? Blood is already drained in the
embalming process. I'm guessing it'd need consent similar to organ donation
though.

~~~
drzaiusapelord
Most people die quietly in hospice or at home, not in the ER, so there's a
logistical problem here. Red blood cells start dying in minutes after host
death, so you don't have a lot of time on your hands in common scenarios.
Biologically, you want healthy blood full of red blood cells not blood low on
red blood cells and full of white blood cells which can cause complications.

The dead also can't answer questions about their illness history. There's a
lot of legwork with blood that organs don't typically require.

~~~
LordKano
The Russians did some research into cadaveric blood transfusions.

The blood is still usable for several hours after clinical death.

I'm not sure about the suitability of using blood from old, sick and/or
heavily medicated people.

------
cableshaft
I'm not exactly sure why, but this makes me feel sadder than capturing and
butchering meat in the modern not very humane way.

Just seeing these crabs with a history stretching back into ancient times,
strapped in and needles inserted into them looks so awful. I don't want to
believe it's considered acceptable practice in the modern era to do such
things, regardless of its medical benefits.

~~~
goldenkey
I agree with you. Just as bad is what's known as Bile Bears. Humanity has a
ways to go with treatment of sentient creatures. Intelligence or species is
not the predicate with which we should dole out misery. Ability to feel pain
is the only thing that matters. And far too many of the creatures we put
through screaming existences are too close to our own hearts...conscious
feelers. That's all we really are beneath it all. Do onto others as you desire
onto yourself.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bile_bear](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bile_bear)

~~~
rexicus
I don't think it's even close ethically to torturing a bear. You know people
boil crabs alive all the time, right?

~~~
libeclipse
I don't think this is a particularly good point to make. You're saying that
since X happened and since X is worse than Y, we shouldn't care about Y.

There's been school shootings so single murders don't matter?

There were so many more deaths in world war two than in world war one, so WWI
doesn't matter?

And this is ignoring the fact that your "worse" claim was based on your own
personal ethics which is, at best, subjective.

~~~
chiliap2
People have a finite amount of time and energy. How do you choose what to
prioritize if not by saying that some things are worse than others? They
didn't say that some things don't matter, just that it doesn't come close
ethically.

------
SloughFeg
Has anyone who is raising ethical concerns of this been around a horseshoe
crab? They are essentially large insects. Killing a cockroach because it was
in your house is objectively worse. It was just bugging you. This is saving
human lives.

~~~
_yosefk
I think the main concern is that they might go extinct.

(Regarding the cockroach - don't Americans have the right to shoot _human_
tresspassers? The crab on the other hand is plucked out of water which is its
own home. This is not to say I'm against the practice - I'm not, unless the
crab might go extinct.)

~~~
dragonwriter
> don't Americans have the right to shoot human tresspassers?

That's a complicated question, but quite often "no" for mere trespass; the
actual laws vary by state.

~~~
77pt77
What about "stand your ground" and "castle" doctrines?

~~~
cyber
Both of these require active threats.

"Stand your ground" laws just mean there is no duty(law) to seek retreat above
all else before actively defending yourself.

"Castle", in California, simply means that if an intruder has bypassed a
control (picked a lock, broke a window, etc) to gain entry then one can
proceed on the assumption that they are there to do grave bodily harm. (And
thus act accordingly.)

~~~
dbg31415
> Both of these require active threats.

Close... they require the person standing-ground to perceive a threat. The
laws do vary state-by-state, but they tend to be universally broad.

"For example, Michigan's stand-your-ground law, MCL 780.972, provides that
"[a]n individual who has not or is not engaged in the commission of a crime at
the time he or she uses deadly force may use deadly force against another
individual anywhere he or she has the legal right to be with no duty to
retreat if ... [t]he individual honestly and reasonably believes that the use
of deadly force is necessary to prevent" the imminent death, great bodily
harm, or sexual assault of himself or another individual."

* Stand-your-ground law - Wikipedia || [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stand-your-ground_law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stand-your-ground_law)

According to this, if I thought someone was a habitual sex offender, I think
I'd be within my right to sniper him from a mile off... so... clearly that's a
stretch... but it has been stretched pretty thin before.

* Joe Horn and Five Years with the Texas Castle Doctrine - The Texas Observer || [https://www.texasobserver.org/joe-horn-and-castle-doctrine-s...](https://www.texasobserver.org/joe-horn-and-castle-doctrine-shootings-in-texas/)

> It’s not that he wanted to shoot the intruders next door, he said, “but if I
> go out there to see what the hell’s going on, what choice am I going to
> have?” The dispatcher told him again to wait for the police, not to go
> outside with his shotgun, that nobody needed to die for stealing.

> Horn was unconvinced. “The laws have been changed…since September the first,
> and I have a right to protect myself,” Horn said. “I ain’t gonna let them
> get away with this shit. I’m sorry, this ain’t right, buddy … They got a bag
> of loot … Here it goes buddy, you hear the shotgun clicking and I’m going.”

> “Move, you’re dead,” he told the men, then he fired three times, killing
> both men, and returned to the phone in his house.

> “I had no choice, they came in the front yard with me, man, I had no
> choice,” he told the dispatcher. Police arrived seconds later. Horn wasn’t
> arrested, nor was he indicted by a grand jury that later considered the
> case.

------
RichardHeart
It may be small consolation, that in the mid term, only humans can prevent
meteor strikes from re-extincting everything on this planet. 99 percent of
every species that has ever existed is permanently extinct. That being said,
I'd love to maintain or grow biodiversity, for it's where we will learn the
most tricks to help ourselves in the mid term.

Thus, if it helps humans a bit, in the long run, it could help all the life on
this planet. Also, these guys are working on the problem
[https://rebelbio.co/sothic-bioscience-saving-human-lives-
and...](https://rebelbio.co/sothic-bioscience-saving-human-lives-and-the-
horseshoe-crab-with-artificial-blue-blood/)

~~~
nkrisc
But what does it matter? The only reason biodiversity is important is because
it creates a better environment for all life on the planet, including us.
There's no cosmic benefit to life existing on Earth, or at all. If humans
weren't around to stop a meteor from wiping all life off the planet what would
it matter?

~~~
RichardHeart
Human consciousness is the most rare and important "thing" in the universe. We
also invented "mattering." Thus, all things that matter, do so, because we're
here.

Nihilism is not only unproductive, it feels bad too. Upgrade to utilitarianism
with a strong personal/local bias. Or, if you're a nice guy, utilitarianism in
general.

~~~
ravenstine
Just because it feels bad to you(doesn't feel bad to me), that doesn't have
any effect on the validity of that perspective. Of course human consciousness
is important to humans, as you pointed out. Did we invent "mattering"? I guess
that depends on if you can actually invent an idea, and if there is
intelligent life elsewhere. Utilitarianism might be more useful at the
societal level, but that still doesn't have any bearing on whether or not an
individual position of nihilism is wrong. It might be a good idea that people
have views that are incorrect about the environment that result in more
biodiversity(though I would guess that biodiversity has diminishing returns),
yet not attributing a mystical value to nature can prevent us from wasting our
time and resources because our judgment is clouded. There's nothing
unproductive about that.

------
catskull
One thing not mentioned in the article is the impact horseshoe crab farming
has had on the Red Knot. PBS made a really interesting documentary about it, I
would highly recommend you check it out.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGMLuEsvHAw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGMLuEsvHAw)

~~~
DennisP
Is the impact positive or negative? It seems like farming the crabs would
solve the problem.

------
wollstonecraft
The relevant limulus proteins can be expressed in vitro.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5302069/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5302069/)

~~~
jfarlow
It looks like (very much like insulin production in vitro) the proteins
involved here are highly modified after translation. Some proteins are usable
right after they are produced by the ribosome, some require extensive
modification to be useful. It looks like Factor-C [1] needs substantial
posttranslational by machinery that is not present to the organisms commonly
used for industrial protein production. So not only do you have to produce the
protein synthetically, but you also have to produce the modification machinery
synthetically.

An additional challenge is that the readout is at the bottom of a signal-
amplified cascade [2]. And that cascade magnifies any error you have at the
top (which is where that finicky Factor-C lives). Older synthetic assays read-
out straight from activation of that first signal from Factor-C. This paper
tries to recreate a portion of the cascade before reading out a result. But
that now means you not only need to produce the Factor-C, the machinery to
ensure Factor-C is properly produced, but you also need at least a few of the
downstream components as well. So now you have a multi-component synthetic
system - with all the grinding through the search-space and tuning that comes
from having to optimize a multi-component biological system in vitro.

That's a pretty complicated problem. The paper just came out less then two
months ago, and concludes, "The present study supports the future production
of recombinant reagents that do not require the use of natural resources".
We're on the right track, but it seems this is actually a tricky problem.

[1] (Factor-C protein)
[http://www.uniprot.org/uniprot/P28175](http://www.uniprot.org/uniprot/P28175)

[2] (Coagulation Cascade)
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5302069/figure/...](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5302069/figure/fig1-1753425916681074/)

------
agumonkey
\- Christian Schafmeister spyroligomer effort (a dsl to design protein tools
to craft proteins IIUC)

\- Woods, Rondelez, Schabanel dna tiles computing (turing complete molecular
computing)

We're not far from being able to leave nature alone .. let's help these guys.

------
beaconstudios
could LAL not be created using recombinant DNA? We already produce insulin
this way, and I can only assume that LAL is a protein. I'm guessing you
couldn't use e. coli as the host though, given the protein's purpose.

------
sandworm101
By mimicing industry the study is working uphill. The more direct approach
would be to bleed and study a captive population. Bleed some already captive
aquarium crabs. Then you can see exactly what happens when you return them to
thier home tanks. That should answer some fundimental mortality and movement
questions in days, if not hours. (Good luck finding a legit aquarium willing
to let its animals participate.)

They also focus too much on the bleeding. What matters is how many die from
both the bleeding and the handling. The "control group" should be wild and
uncaught animals.

~~~
Fomite
One of the problems with your approach is that many industry groups have used
"Well, this study doesn't exactly mimic field conditions, so it's not
valid..." in the past.

~~~
sandworm101
That assumes that we are looking to answer the entire question. I'd babystep
towards that by first answering some basics. I want to know how much blood you
can take and how long before the animal fully recovers. That can be better
done in an aquarium setting with animals who are well-observed before and
after. If draining a quart out of each captive animal kills 30%, that is a
huge red flag without the hassle of radio tagging.

I remember reading an interesting article about bleeding squirrels to study
their relationship with snakes (through blood one can tell if they have every
been bitten by a venomous snake). Squirrels don't have much blood. So the
scientists determined that they needed a caged recovery period with free
food/water, and a shot of antibiotics, before being returned. Maybe too these
crabs.

------
tree_of_item
Lots of people are saying this is absolutely awful but I really don't get it.

> There are currently no quotas on how many crabs one can bleed because
> biomedical laboratories drain only a third of the crab's blood, then put
> them back into the water, alive.

If it's just a needle insertion, why is this such a big deal? The crabs
shouldn't be bleeding after, and I don't see why they would be very damaged.

It's saving human lives. I don't think it's ridiculous to say that human lives
are worth more than some momentary discomfort for crabs.

~~~
justinator
> I don't think it's ridiculous to say that human lives are worth more than
> some momentary discomfort for crabs.

Well: says the human.

~~~
aeturnum
You're right, people would never accept a regime where humans were drained of
some of their blood in order to give other humans medical treatment with that
blood.

~~~
mirimir
Well, it's OK if it's voluntary. But that gets murky for prisoners, who
arguably can't freely decline.

~~~
maxerickson
Even setting aside statistics about various communicable diseases, prejudice
would make use of prisoner blood a tenuous thing.

(I mean beliefs about prisoners being "bad" or "tainted" or whatever and
people not wanting to receive their blood)

~~~
throwanem
Few whole-blood transfusions occur in a setting where the patient can inquire
in detail as to provenance.

~~~
maxerickson
Of course. That doesn't mean people wouldn't react to news about blood being
collected in prisons.

------
ReedJessen
Interesting article. Never heard any of this before.

I am ever so slightly skeptical.

I wouldn't be surprised if this while article was a fabrication created as
some social experiment to test was people will believe. "We bleed 1/3 of the
blood out of HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of horseshoe crabs then put them back in
the wild... and you have never heard about it or seen it happen."

This article just sets off my radar is a particular "April Fool's!" kind of
way. Can't put my finger on it.

~~~
phoenixstrike
Just wanted to say I have heard of this going back a few years. Skepticism is
good but I didn't think there was anything overt in the article that raised
red flags. Let's please not brush this off. There are tons of niche markets
and industries and practices that you don't hear about. Anyone who has worked
at a large company knows just how many hidden markets there are for all sorts
of random shit. You just have to pay attention.

------
spraak
Take take take, don't give back. The earth isn't concerned with our human
antics - it just responds in kind. We are bringing our own demise

------
dbg31415
> There are currently no quotas on how many crabs one can bleed because
> biomedical laboratories drain only a third of the crab's blood, then put
> them back into the water, alive. But no one really knows what happens to the
> crabs once they're slipped back into the sea. Do they survive? Are they ever
> the same?

Seems like it'd be easy enough to figure out if they are surviving or not, and
seems like we could make adjustments to how much blood is drained based on the
weight of the crab if we are killing them (or drain more blood so we kill
fewer of them). How hard is it to glue an RFID tag on each one and dump them
into a football field sized enclosure with a net wall around it?

Or maybe we release them into a nutrient rich tank full of their favorite food
before we release them back into the wild? The equivalent of giving them a
juice box after a blood draw?

Now... as for cruelty... yup, it's pretty barbaric sounding. I don't know how
to weight this against human suffering they are helping to avert. I'm certain
that if we were smaller than them, they just eat us and not think twice about
it. Nice we have evolved to the point where we care about other types of life,
isn't it? No clue how to measure human vs crab life, but I have to think that
human life is a bit more valuable -- at least to other humans.

Presumably this blood draining procedure has gone through a medical ethics
review?

~~~
jmcgough
> Presumably this blood draining procedure has gone through a medical ethics
> review?

There's no IRB because it's not funded research, just harvesting resources
from animals.

When it comes to farming, there are no federal laws governing treatment of
farmed animals, and most states exempt farmed animals from anti-cruelty laws.
I doubt this would actually be categorized as farming, so there's likely no
regulations around it.

------
goldenkey
F'ed up if you ask me. Imagine that being done to you by an alien species.

~~~
dmix
How is this anywhere close to the same as Alien species using humans? We
differentiate treatment by intelligence of species for a good reason. We allow
courts to deal with the subtleties of what is considered cruel and unusual
punishment for humans as well from this rational perspective, allowing certain
degrees depending on context.

I'm against whales and dolphins being kept in small area confinement. But I
could hardly care about a crab being bled.

The only concern is on the survivability of the species and the effect on the
greater ecosystem.

This is very rational and I don't see anything morally wrong with it. Nor do
the vast majority of other scientists. Many of whom know much more about the
species than I do.

The end result is we have a unique way to test for bacteria in a variety of
applications that at most save lives, or at a minimum vastly improve the
quality.

> Their distinctive blue blood is used to detect dangerous Gram-negative
> bacteria such as E. coli in injectable drugs such as insulin, implantable
> medical devices such as knee replacements, and hospital instruments such as
> scalpels and IVs.

~~~
goldenkey
At least kill the f'kin things if you are gonna drain them of their blood.
Seems like its just a poor excuse to say 'we didnt kill them..they are just
fine! *drops crab back into water with half of its blood supply'

Based on what I read, these crabs are basically given a death sentence. I'd
rather them be killed and harvested than bloodsucked tortured and thrown back
into a predator ecosystem where they are too delirious and pretty much get
butchered by whatever's out there.

~~~
openasocket
It isn't a death sentence: the overwhelming majority survive, and even go
through the process again. If they killed them outright the species would go
extinct. Of those two options, this is the environmentally friendly one.

~~~
coding123
However I wonder at what point we're affecting their ability to mate,
reproduce, etc..

~~~
novia
While reading the article I was wondering, would things be better if they only
bled the male horseshoe crabs? In mammals you theoretically need fewer healthy
males than females to successfully produce the next generation. However, since
horseshoe crabs fertilize the eggs once they have been laid, I'm not sure
whether the same population dynamic is at play.

------
Asooka
Can horseshoe crabs actually feel pain? I thought their nervious systems were
too simple for that, ergo there's practically no ethical concerns with doing
whatever you want to them, as long as it doesn't lead to genocide.

~~~
tim333
Probably they can. Pain detection evolved so organisms can avoid damaging
their bodies. There's no reason to think that doesn't apply to crabs.

~~~
prodikl
i think this is the most logical answer. i would imagine pain appeared very
early in a common ancestor as its effect on survival is absolutely immense

