• @CluckN@lemmy.world
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      2051 year ago

      It’s catch and release so they let them go afterwards where they found them. Horseshoe crab blood is an essential biomedical tool that’s saved countless lives.

        • @CluckN@lemmy.world
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          1341 year ago

          It’s an anticoagulant and can detect the smallest traces of endotoxins in medicine. I’m sure I’m missing some details but there are some great medical journals that detail the process and help explain why it’s $60,000 a gallon.

          • @Mercival@lemm.ee
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            461 year ago

            It is not an anticoagulant, quite the opposite actually. The blood (limulus amoebocyte lysate) will coagulate at the slightest hint of gram-negative bacteria and their endotoxins.

            It’s most likely a defense mechanism against bacterial infections.

            It’s widely used in medicine to check for bacterial contamination of injectable pharmaceuticals.

            • peopleproblems
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              71 year ago

              Woah. Are horseshoe crabs like other crustaceans in that they eat pretty much anything including/mostly detritus?

              If thats the case, than how would it be beneficial to have blood that coagulates so easily?

              Wouldn’t every meal lead to a crab version of a stroke?

              • @Mercival@lemm.ee
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                61 year ago

                Horseshoe crabs are not crusteceans, they are early chelicerates.

                They have an open circulatory system, where the blood (heamolymph) freely spills out of the arteries into surrounding tissues, so a small clot probably wouldn’t cause issues. Think of it like a cyst, sometimes if an infection can’t be removed by the immune system, your body will just enclose it in a capsule, so it can’t spread.

                  • @MeanEYE@lemmy.world
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                    71 year ago

                    Well, he asked if they are like other crustaceans, so the answer is they are not crustaceans so no, they are not like others.

          • @Zron@lemmy.world
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            361 year ago

            Where can someone find these horseshoe crabs?

            And are they able to be bred in captivity?

            Pls respond fast, I’m already driving to home depot to buy the largest above ground pool they have.

        • @EvilCartyen@feddit.dk
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          381 year ago

          The blood contains a coagulent which clots in the presence of bacterial toxins. It is extracted and used to ensure that medical equipent and stuff such as vaccines are sterile and safe.

        • @prayer@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          The main use is to detect how much endotoxins (proteins that cause our immune system to react) are present in a sample. This is important because we often use bacteria/fungus/yeast to produce medicine and then remove the microorganism from that medicine. This checks for anything left behind in that process, far more sensitive than any other test or machine can do.

          If it wasn’t for horseshoe crab blood, creating medicine that is safe for injection would be a lot harder and potentially more dangerous.

          • @Rolder@reddthat.com
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            71 year ago

            Wonder why we can’t just make the coagulant ourselves. Or maybe we can but milking crabs is still cheaper.

            • @prayer@lemmy.world
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              31 year ago

              My guess without checking would be regulatory. The FDA doesn’t want to approve an alternative to an already working method unless it can be shown to truly be an alternative. That testing is lengthy and expensive.

            • @wolfpack86@lemmy.world
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              21 year ago

              It’s not a chemical compound, the active component is an amebocyte. Same reason we can’t just make red blood cells and need other humans to donate them.

              There have been other attempts at making synthetic coagulants without broad success. The thing that seems to be the most effective at minimizing the horseshoe crab burden is using machines to do the detection and cut down on the amount of LAL needed vs running the test visually.

    • Alabaster_Mango
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      1 year ago

      Here’s a description of the bleeding process:

      https://www.horseshoecrab.org/med/bestpractices.html

      It’s specifically non-fatal:

      Bleeding horseshoe crabs to death is not an acceptable practice in the U.S.

      The volume of blood taken is actually quite small, as most of the material in the collection jars is anticoagulant.

      It may look uncomfortable to us humans, but keep in mind that horseshoe crabs are not human. What’s normal for the spider is chaos for the fly. Granted, it would be kinda weird to be hoisted from your home by a giant ape and forced into a blood drive. It’s done as gently as possible though.

          • @bstix@feddit.dk
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            01 year ago

            Hmm. Assuming that the production was actually harmless, what’s the difference between wearing a wool sweater made from excess animal production of wool and using a vaccine made from excess animal blood?

            • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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              41 year ago

              No such thing as “excess blood”, brother. That’s why we generally want it to stay inside of our bodies.

              • @bstix@feddit.dk
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                31 year ago

                Yes donors voluntarily give up a pint of blood every month, because it replenishes.

                • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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                  21 year ago

                  That’s still not excess, lest you think there’s such a thing as “excess skin” because when you get cut eventually it heals.

              • Vegans can receive transfusions because I believe it’s down to “consent”. Humans consent to the blood draw. Crabs do not.

                So vegans shouldn’t be taking any medicine or vaccines that have had blood crab blood used in their manufacture.

                I have discovered the solution to the vegan problem! Tell all vegans about medicine being made using animal blood and they will die out faster than their B12 & iron deficiency does at the moment!

                Patent Pending

      • @shalafi@lemmy.world
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        221 year ago

        Still, I was disappointed to find that a large percentage of released crabs die anyway. Can’t find the number, but it’s significant. 1/3rd?

        • @lemmylommy@lemmy.world
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          101 year ago

          Afair estimates put the portion of dead crabs between 10 and 30%. Some might also be unable to reproduce due to the bleeding.

          • @Mercival@lemm.ee
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            141 year ago

            Sadly a lot of the companies harvesting them will just kill and sell them for bait anyways.

            Of those that are released, about a third die. Not to say about the decrease in overall fitness, which can lead to them falling prey more easily.

            It’s obviously a traumatic experience for the animal in the best case scenario and that is going to reflect on their ability to survive in the wild.

        • Alabaster_Mango
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          11 year ago

          Oh, I don’t mean the “blood donation” being normal. The person I was responding to asked why they were being drained “this way”. I assumed they were concerned about the folded-over positioning of the crab.

          Also, counter argument (in good fun): plenty of animals get their blood drained regularly in nature. Mosquitos, ticks, leaches, and vampire bats are a few examples of things that drain blood from others. Maybe the crabs see us as giant pests?

          Defo not the best arrangement for the crabs though. As others pointed out to me, apparently despite the optimistic wording in the link I shared the process is still fatal to some. I’m glad we’re working on alternatives.

      • @voluble@lemmy.world
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        -31 year ago

        Thanks for the link and info.

        Not a reply directly to you, but to contrast the dominant view in the thread - what would it matter if even 100% of the crabs died? Sustainability considerations aside - a crab died for my delicious salad, who cares if they die for a life saving vaccine? Who cares if it’s painful and disorienting for the crab, it’s a crab. As humans, why should we prioritize crab life and well-being over our own?

          • @voluble@lemmy.world
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            -41 year ago

            Ripple effects, sure, I’m with you there, sustainability considerations, which I haven’t seen anyone mentioning ITT.

            I completely disagree with you about the status of humanity. Is it really your view that the well-being of a crab has equivalent moral status to your own well-being?

            • I completely disagree with you about the status of humanity.

              Why because we happened to evolve to think? Given enough time something else would of if not us. Given we may end up causing our species to go extinct due to careless disregard for our environment and even human life in general. We really are not that special and it would serve us to treat the ecosystems, which enable life on this planet to thrive and evolve, with respect if we want to live long enough too see other stars or at least leave the planet in a decent state for the next species if we all die from pointless wars like humanity seems to love doing regardless of if we treat our environment better.

            • @RubberElectrons@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              I don’t like hurting animals. If one believes we really are a special species because of things like our innate curiosity, I think you’ll understand the interesting quest to try to eat without hurting anyone/thing.

              Why? Better, why not?

              • Consider how difficult “getting off this rock” is with live food onboard. Plants can directly feed humans with limited processing. With some processing, you can make tasty high protein burgers that taste a lot like beef. Admittedly, still not nutritionally the same as beef, but compensable in other ways.
              • We’re a concious species (mostly), why not try to avoid hurting our fellow companions in this barren wasteland called space? Who else do we have in the known universe?

              I still eat eggs & cheese. Perhaps a day will come where I don’t need those either. I hope you’ll be curious enough to try some alternatives too.

              • @voluble@lemmy.world
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                71 year ago

                I’ve read good moral arguments for a veganism. I think it’s the right thing to do when it comes to diet. For what it’s worth, this isn’t really a discussion about diet.

                It isn’t a decision between a lentil burger and a beef burger, this is an animal resource that can assist in saving human lives. There are other clotting factors used in medicine, and that’s great, let’s use and develop those. But suppose something more lethal and dangerous than COVID comes along, and vaccines need to be produced quickly and globally. I think it would be foolish to wince if we needed to take crab blood to roll out a program that would save human lives.

                • @RubberElectrons@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  I’m vegetarian for moral reasons primarily. Steak smells great, I miss al pastor tacos, etc. But, nothing wrong with wincing, doing the extraction as gently as possible, and trying to keep the crabs alive as well. Sure, we gotta live too but I won’t accept taking every other creature with us just so we can survive.

                  We need to degrow a bit. As a species, humanity is running the planet a little too close to the redline, to put it mildly. Overpopulation has almost guaranteed a dependency on fossil fuels for more than just powering farm equipment, we now artificially produce fertilizer out of it.

                  Nothing is black and white, and the older I get, the more shades I see. I think we can exist, in a less damaging way that people can enjoy. We humans can, should, and will strive for better.

            • @angrystego@lemmy.world
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              31 year ago

              I don’t know about spacecowboy, but I do. I still eat crabs, but I don’t think I’m superior to them morally just because I’m more intelligent or something. We’re just animals eating each other.

              • @voluble@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                What I mean when I say moral is, I don’t see why it’s wrong if a bunch of invertebrates are subjugated, in pain, or die in order to provide something that improves the lives of humans. It’s not sad, it’s a good thing. “Oh but the crabs get stressed out, and 30% might die”, yeah, who cares, they’re crabs.

                Sure, I’m a human, and I have a particular perspective on these things. But, we are special. Anyone who considers a trolley problem with a crab on one track, and a human on the other and honestly says, “hey it doesn’t matter humans aren’t special”, that’s, unappealing. In a purely academic, cosmic, arrangement of particles sense, OK, nothing is special. But in that condition, the suffering of animals isn’t even a question worth considering.

                The fact that so many accounts in this thread are going out of their way to give weight to the well-being of invertebrates, in a conversation about human well-being, is baffling.

                Should we be using existing clotting factors in medical settings that don’t rely on the blood of an endangered species that lives in an incredibly volatile habitat? Probably, but crab discomfort is at the very bottom of the list of reasons why.

                • @angrystego@lemmy.world
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                  51 year ago

                  People can think of other species as being morally as valuable as people and not be psychotic.

                  They can also chose the human in the trolley problem and still feel bad for the crab. If the trolley problem included people from my familly and strangers, I’d chose my family, but not because I think it’s morally superior. I would feel bad for the other people.

                  The line where compassion stops can be drawn anywhere. Many people draw it where their nation or race ends. Many people draw it at the elusive pet/food distinction. Many people draw it where being mammal stops.

                  I don’t think drawing the line is based on moral principles. It’s practical. Sometimes you need to eat meat, sometimes you need to fight in a war. But when it comes to morality animal lives are animal lives, no matter whether it’s a crab or a white male human. They’re either all worthy of compassion or non of them is.

                  So that’s my point of view. And thanks for your previous answer.

                  • @voluble@lemmy.world
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                    21 year ago

                    Disclosure - Before you had replied, I edited out the word ‘psychotic’ above, felt it was unfair.

                    Cheers, thanks for the thoughtful and reasonable reply. I agree with most of what you say. & it circles something I think about a lot but haven’t made much sense of (if there even is sense to make if it), which is, the role of bad feelings in moral decision making.

                    I think though, the compassion line should be drawn somewhere, sometimes, with moral reason as a guide. To dip into the quagmire of philosophical thought experiments, you know, what if certain humans produced this special clotting factor, and we had to bleed them to get it, and it came with a risk of their mortality? I think reasonable people could agree, that would be an entirely different question to grapple with. So, you know, I would say it does matter, it’s not a black & white thing, where either everything is worthy of compassion or nothing is. The circumstance can, should, dictate the moral approach. Eating meat, fighting in wars, there might be a right or wrong that’s worth determining there. And knowing that, the moral and the practical are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

                    And totally, I expect people to have differences when it comes to compassion. Suppose I’m just surprised at the outpouring of love for the gross horseshoe crab, in spite of its real usefulness for global human health. Or at least my understanding of it, which I admit, is not very deep.

                • @ParsnipWitch@feddit.de
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                  11 year ago

                  Because some people see morality not as something that’s subjective but believe it is a moral objective truth that suffering should be reduced as much as possible.

                  That’s not more or less rational than to believe humans are somehow ‘special’.

                  • @voluble@lemmy.world
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                    11 year ago

                    For the sake of argument, let’s take for granted your statement, that ‘suffering should be reduced as much as possible’.

                    If the discomfort of a single crab can prevent worse discomfort/suffering/death of many other beings, and results in reduced net pain, then the utilitarian line of reasoning seems to be that we might actually be morally obligated to take blood from crabs.

                • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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                  01 year ago

                  “Oh but the crabs get stressed out, and 30% might die”, yeah, who cares, they’re crabs.

                  “If I shot a couple of your fingers off, who cares, you’re not me. I only care about me.”

                  The fact that so many accounts in this thread are going out of their way to give weight to the well-being of invertebrates, in a conversation about human well-being, is baffling.

                  That’s called not being a cunt.

            • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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              11 year ago

              I’d rather see a dead human than a dead non-human, to be honest… (with the exception of insects, those buggers freak me out).

                  • @abraxas@sh.itjust.works
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                    -11 year ago

                    Not quite sure how this answer is relevant. Childfree, or just too young to have kids yourself? The question stands for your mother, a sibling, a niece/nephew, a girlfriend, or whatever makes no stop and consider for a second that you just said you’re okay with random, innocent people suffering and dying.

        • @Kedly@lemm.ee
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          41 year ago

          Because we HAVE to kill a crab to eat it, we shouldnt be killing or harming other animals unless we “need” to. If theres a way to harvest blood without killing the animal, that is the ethically cleanest option. I do think we should prioritize helping our own species over others, but that doesnt mean ignoring the suffering or harm of other species

    • @ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      Highest chance of survival/low stress

      Edit: many do die still. I don’t want to say it’s safe, just safer

    • @Darken@reddthat.com
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      51 year ago

      That’s how blueberry is made Freeze some of this add some structure, let it set, then put it on trees

      • erin (she/her)
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        01 year ago

        This is a necessary evil to save many many human lives. Alternatives are being worked on, but this isn’t just for money or food, it’s for lifesaving medicine.