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Science 9 July 2004:
Vol. 305. no. 5681, p. 174
DOI: 10.1126/science.305.5681.174d
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Random Samples

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the sale of leeches as a medical device. The French company that received FDA's thumbs up, Ricarimpex SAS, has been breeding leeches for 150 years. Although this is the first time FDA has explicitly granted permission for a company to sell them, there are plenty of homegrown leech vendors; several were grandfathered in under a 1976 law requiring the licensing of medical-device sellers.

Medical leeches, Hirudo medicinalis, are already used in plastic surgery to remove pooled blood from damaged areas, says Carl Krasniak of the Slocum-Dickson Medical Group in New Hartford, New York. The animals use a combination of chemicals in their saliva to prevent clotting and suck blood. FDA deemed them "devices" because their sucking action is considered more medically important than their anticlotting saliva.




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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)