Animal testing has for a long time been a much debated moral issue. For many, this kind of testing has been the only kind of hope for developing new medicines and treatments for illness. For others, it is an unacceptable and unnecessary cruel way of exploiting animals for our own purposes. Treatments for illnesses such as tuberculosis, diabetes, kidney failure and asthma have all been discovered, and vaccinations against polio, diphtheria, tetanus and measles for example have all been found.
There are strict laws in place for using animals for testing and research purposes, so as to minimise any pain and distress the animals may encounter.
The Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 ensures that the usage of animals must be kept to a
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He explains why this is the case.
"An anti-rheumatic drug killed 76 people in Britain, and 3500 others were left seriously ill. This particular medication had been researched using animals for seven years, which is a clear example of how humans and animals do not always react in the same ways. Also, thousands of people with heart conditions suffered having taken another medicine which had been tested on animals. In fact, the same drug (Eraldin) has, so far, not acted on any other species of animal in the same way that it acted on humans."
The development of new anti-HIV drugs has also been a key issue regarding the inconsistencies of animal testing. In 1989 a major pharmaceutical company was working what seemed to be a potentially very successful drug. However, in trials on dogs and rats, all the animals died. Research immediately stopped as the company presumed it would have the same fatal effect on humans. It is clear though in the examples of the anti-rheumatic drug and Eraldin that humans and animals will not necessarily be affected in the same way. Because of the death of the dogs and rats, trials of a new HIV treatment did not start again until 1993. These 4 years lost could have saved many lives, had the researchers carried on testing of the new drug. Also, HIV is a disease which only affects humans, so the results of the animal tests may not have been
Human Society International has conducted many studies over the years and found that animals used in experiments are force fed , subjected to water dehydration and physical exhaustion, or inflicted them with burns and wounds, using other torturing methods to check that the medicines or anything that companies will sell us
Throughout history, animal testing has played an important role in leading to new discoveries and human benefit. However, what many people forget are the great numbers of animals that have suffered serious harm during the process of animal testing. Animal testing is the use of animals in biological, medical, and psychological studies. The development and enhancement of medical research has been based on the testing of animals. There are many questions being asked if animal research is good or not or if the benefit for us is way greater the abuse of animals. Doing tests on animals can help find ways to cure diseases, but testing on them is wrong. Although we want to find cures for diseases to help many people, testing on animals not only
Throughout the years the use of animals in medical research has been a hot debate around the world. Although animal testing may be cruel and inhumane, thousands of humans are saved thanks to the research that animals supply researchers with. Animals testing have taken over our knowledge of medicine and treatments to a whole different level. Animal testing also does this in a cheap and effective way. Without animals testing out knowledge wouldn’t be up to date, in other words animals’ testing is good.
The testing of animals in scientific and commercial research has been debated for many years. Some people view animals as companions or part of the family, but others think of them as a way to advance medicine by providing researchers with a means to develop better medical techniques, discovering vaccines, and helping to find a cure for a disease. Regardless of how a person may view animals, they are worthy of better protection by our government and us as a society. Although some animal testing has been successful, there are research alternatives that could eliminate the pain, suffering, and deaths that animals endure in scientific research. Therefore, animals should not be used in scientific research
It is human nature to survive at any cost, even if it is at the expense of animals we may typically see in our everyday lives. The use of animals in pharmacological education and research is nothing new and dates way back to the ancient times. The amount of data that has been acquired from these animal testings has allowed for modern medicine to improve and opened new gateways for further development of newer medication, but at what cost?
Through testing with animal research scientist have been able to create new cures and treat once thought incurable diseases. Many biomedical experiments developed treatments for anthrax, rabies, polio and smallpox, as well as developed anti-depressants, tranquilizers and antibiotics for medical use. Advocates of the opposition are hardly reasonable as their opinions are adjusted purely for emotional value. Their main argument is the fact that animal testing harms
95% of drugs fail in human trials despite promising results in animal tests. This is because of the different genes between a human and an animal. The failure of the drugs can also be caused due to the fact that out of 93 dangerous drug side effects, only 19% could have been predicated by animal tests. Another piece of evidence that has been brought to the attention of many is that the testing of animals is a waste. Only 6% of 4,300 international companies involved in drug development have registered a new drug with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration since 1950. Even those drugs that are approved are not universally effective due to individual reactions, the top ten highest-grossing drugs in the U.S. only help between 1 in 4 and 1 in 25 people who take them. The last reason why animal testing should be reconsidered is common sense but overlooked. Animals are much more different from humans than imagined. Animals are incapable of being diagnosed of the same diseases that humans are. Their bodies do not allow them to have illnesses such as Parkinson’s disease, major types of heart disease, many types of cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, HIV or schizophrenia. A simple drug like aspirin is toxic to many animals, including cats, mice and rats and would not be on our pharmacy shelves if it had been tested according to current animal testing
Thousands of each species are killed every year against their will due to animal testing. Most people are under the misconception that animal experiments enhance human cures due to the media, experimenters, and universities which exaggerate animals’ potential and the role they have played in past medical advancements. Researching thoroughly on websites, books, articles and organizations, I will prove the common misconception that animals are needed for human advancement to be incorrect. Animal testing is proven to hurt humans directly and misleading animal experiments causes humans to dispose of cures.
Tests that pass animals can have major effects on human’s population. In the UK 70,000 people die or are severely disabled by medical drugs that have passed animal tests(33 Reasons Why). This can show how unreliable it is and why it would not be good to use medicine that is not tested on humans. In America 106,000 people die from medical drugs (33 Reasons Why). This shows that more people in America trust this type of medication. Not only this but treatment tortures and kills animals, they can not only ruin human population but animal’s too.
Now it is not hard to at least understand why some people might be pro-animal testing when it comes to medical reasons. It could save human lives. But is that really true? There are a huge differences between humans and the animals that the products are tested on. For example, animals don’t develop the human AIDS syndrome. So, the use of animals for AIDS medications has been useless. Even though these differences do exist, there have been significant research benefits from using animal testing.
Corneal transplants were delayed for 90 years and blood transfusion were delayed 200 years due to animal studies (1). Less then two percent of human illnesses of 1.16% are ever seen in animals (1). Scientists believe that by performing these tests on animals is to ensure the safety of the new drugs (HIV drugs, vaccines and animal testing 2). Also to see whether such products might be effective in humans (2). Finally for general research into the biology of an animal, or the function and action of certain diseases within their bodies (2). Animal safety tests usually come at the end of the long process of safety date collection that may include testing the product ‘ in vitro’ and using a computer program to simulate what might happen to the drug inside the body (2). The regulations on what safety data is required for a new product vary from country to country, but more drug authorities require all three types of data (2). Animals are fairly poor substitutes for humans because the compounds that are released in the animals bodies might be harmful, but could kill a human (2). Result in this was an anti-inflammatory drug that caused major organ failure in six men involved in a trial at Northwick Park Hospital in London, England in 2006 (2). Such occurrences are rare (2). HIV is a retrovirus to humans which it is rarely found in any animals (2). Some African primates are naturally infected with SIV which is believed to be
Animal research today cannot be carried out without extreme regulations and laws put in place to protect the animals used. Laboratories will follow the local state laws
Animal testing has been known for the life-changing breakthroughs but also for the alarming number of deaths throughout the years. Many years have gone by since the first experiment on an animal but when is the world going to realize that animals and humans are not the same.
Continuing, animal testing has been proven to be unnecessary for the development of medicine. In the past, animals were the only reliable means to develop cures for the world. That was then, this is now. Today’s world has brought forth new means of experimenting. Alternatives to animal testing have been
Most of the medications that we in market today have been tested and proven effective for animals before prescribing them to human beings. However, would it feel good to know that every year, hundreds of thousands of animals are captured from the wild and die just because of these said experiments? For many years now, scientists have been using animals for their laboratory experiments to produce new medicines. Although scientists have been using this process for many decades in the field of medicine, it is still a controversial issue for those who are pro animal experimentation and against animal experimentation. Both sides have been arguing about the necessity of these procedures of the medical field. Carl Cohen, a vocal animal