Animal testing or animal experimentation is a necessary evil. At least that is what some say. Others believe animal testing should cease as society evolves past the need to experiment on living creatures. The topic remains a hot button issue.
It rings especially true for those who adopt a vegan lifestyle and believe animals should have the same rights as people in terms of value of life and so forth. Although animal testing has ceased in some cosmetic companies and label their goods as not animal tested, most companies, especially pharmaceutical companies, rely on animals to test drugs and vaccines in order to promote evolution of medicine but refrain from putting human lives at risk. This essay will show the pro and con sides of animal testing/animal experimentation. Does it remain as unavoidable or can society move past animal testing and find new ways to test products and medicines?
Background
Animal testing
Literature
The current literature shows pros and cons to animal testing and perhaps helps illustrate the need or aversion to animal testing. For example, the pro-side argues animal testing helps avoid loss of human life by enabling experimentation and discovery of vaccines and medicines that could help cure alleviate disease and injury in humans. The con may argue animal experimentation promotes a negative society focused on brutality and violence. Animal experimentation became so reviled thanks to campaigns against the subject showing animals tested on, that companies have gone so far as to state they do not test on animals. The literature will present pros and cons and help deliver a conclusion and opinion on the topic.
Con
In 2012, Michael Balls wrote an article discussing the new ways in which pharmaceutical companies could test drugs on human cells without hurting humans and eliminating entirely animal testing. Essentially people could donate cells to a clinic that then retains those cells, replicate them and provide them to pharma and researchers to test their theories and products.
Cells will be provided to academic researchers, private -- public partnerships, biotechs and pharma for research, early drug discovery and safety assessment. The aim of the iPS cell centre is, therefore, to respond to the current and rapidly increasing demand for efficacy and toxicity testing using iPS cells from disease relevant populations (Balls 191)
The innovation comes at the heels of a recent vegan movement championing the elimination of all animal derived or animal tested products from the market. Not only will pharma and other private or public organizations have the ability to test effectively their products, they can do so without harming living creatures.
This is an important step towards the complete elimination of animal testing and may in fact cause a ripple among pharmaceutical companies and research studies much as it did in the cosmetics industry. Cells, human cells show what drugs may do to cell health and may in fact provide better results than animal testing. Currently researchers do animal testing mainly on rodents. Their physiology is different from humans. To test on human cells allows for higher accuracy and faster turnaround in trials.
Another article by Pal discusses the kinds of animals used for testing. "An entire scientific discipline, known as gnotobiology, is devoted to establishing and controlling the microbial status of laboratory animals." (Pal 9) These are animals normally are taken via cesarean and then kept pathogenic free to allow for optimal conditions during experimentation. Although the kinds of animals used are based on government regulations, the author explains that researchers and those experimenting on animals remain unfamiliar on how to deal with animal euthanasia and maintenance. Veterinarians for example, could come and give recommendations for effective euthanasia and so forth. However, most drug companies and businesses do not retain veterinarians as consultants and thus operate without full awareness of the animals suffering.
This article provides insight on the kinds of animals used for experimentation as well as the scientific interest in maintaining certain conditions for lab animals. These conditions do not come from recommendations from specialists of animal care, but rather, to ensure adequate sampling and experimentation. It explains well the level of attention paid to the status of the animal vs. The well-being of the animal.
Pros
Although science and medicine have delivered better ways of experimentation that remove the need for animal or human testing, some things still remain a problem and require animal experimentation to continue developments of products and methods.
In vivo studies using the animals are helpful in developing the treatment strategies, as they are important link between the successful in vitro testing and safe human use. Various research projects in the field of...
By using animals in research, and through animal research science learns how certain chemicals "interact with living systems"; this knowledge can be "translated into protection of humans, animals, and the environment from toxic levels of natural -- as well as man-made -- exposures (SOT, 6). Legal and professional accountability In Canada there are Research Ethics Boards (REBs) that have the power to authorize or reject funding for experiments with animals; when
Animal Testing Negatives of Animal Testing Outweigh Its Positives and Therefore Should Not be Allowed Many cures and treatments have been developed in the last three hundred years due to advances in medical technology. These developments are sometimes attributed partly to the fact that scientists and researchers have been able to use animals as "guinea pigs" for testing new medications or treatment methods before passing them to human volunteers. There is strong
Animal testing is not only for the benefit of the humans but is also beneficial to the animals themselves. "The research of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences benefits animals because NIEHS research contributes to protecting the environment for all the life that shares the earth - companion animals, farm animals, wildlife, marine life - and plant life as well" (Anonymous). Much more animals are consumed as a
Animal Testing: Cosmetics and Toiletries Animal testing is the use of non-human animals in a variety of experiments (Wikipedia, 2005) Many experiments aim to test certain substances to determine their effect on humans, or to test medical or psychological hypotheses. Animal testing is a very controversial and well-researched topic. Proponents and opponents constantly argue over both ethical concerns and the effectiveness of the practice of using animals for scientific research. The term "vivisection"
These experiments are done to see how the humans fair on with the treatment or the diseases without putting much consideration to whether it would survive or die FRAME Reduction Committee, 2005() Some other ways in which animals are unethically used for scientific purposes include in cases where Genetically modification is done on animals where some of their genes are added or removed as per type of experiment done, use
However, it is also characteristic for them to be in total agreement with the procedure when it involves their well-being or the welfare of someone close to them. Ed Owen's (2005) testimony regarding his daughter and how she manages to stay alive due to the large amount of medicine that she takes is certainly breathtaking. Even more amazing is the fact that most of the medicine that she uses
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