Evaluation of Chronic Rodent Bioassays and Ames Assay Tests as Accurate Models for Predicting Human Carcinogens

Abstract

The question “What percentages of mammalian carcinogens and noncarcinogens can be predicted by bacterial mutation tests?” probably cannot be answered for the following two reasons:

• 1.) There seems to be no universal agreement upon what criteria are absolutely necessary to unequivocally establish a carcinogen for mammals. Consequently, the bull’s eye of the target for which the bacterial tests must aim continually shifts, causing the results of comparisons conducted at one point in time to be adjusted at a different point in time.

• 2.) Carcinogen results are not obtained for “mammals”, they are obtained in unique mammalian species which often differ among themselves as to whether a particular chemical is a carcinogen or not. Bacterial tests might hopefully match the results in a single mammalian model but cannot be expected to match the combined results from several mammalian species which fail to agree among themselves as to the correct answer.