Argumentative Essay: When Is Animal Testing Justified?

Approximately 225 million animals are used for testing every year. Billions have been killed in the process. ("Questions and Answers About Biomedical Research.”) How can this be allowed? Isn’t it cruel to use animals to test products for humans? Many animal rights activists say, “yes” to this question. However, scientists argue it is necessary and animal research can help save human lives. There are probable arguments for both sides. But the dangers of using animals to test products for human use weighs an even greater risk than not using the animals. Alternatives are much more ethical.

There is much debate over whether animal testing should be allowed or not. Some people think that it is not essential to sacrifice animals for human benefits because they are being abused and tortured severely during experiments. Some others who stand against animal testing claim that humans eliminate many lives on earth in order to safe humans’ lives, so there is no justice because even animals have the right to live on earth, yet these people do not consider the truth that animals are being used in the food industry or in the laboratories. Thus, if someone asks how many animals are being used in the laboratory experiments around the world every year, who can give an accurate answer? It can be one, ten, or fifty million. It is difficult to find the exact figure on this question because people only read news through mass media such as having a new vaccine which can help human avoid uterus cancer or a new medicine help humans cure strokes, but they also need to know how many lives of the animals would have to take in order to get theses vaccines. Therefore, some organizes think that animal testing is one of the most disturbing experiments ever, and it should be banned. Despite many controversies with opposing opinions, a compromise can be made in order to reduce the use of animals in the laboratory experiments.

At this moment, tens of millions of animals, such as rats, rabbits, monkeys, cats, and dogs, plus more, are being locked inside cages in labs all throughout the country due to being used in horrific experiments. These animal experiments are used to develop and enhance new drugs and to test the safety of products before being used on humans. Many of these experiments inflict pain to the animals and decrease their satisfactory of life. More than a hundred million animals suffer and die every year in the U.S. from medical education and clinical experiments, as well as merciless chemical, drug, food, and cosmetic tests. Animals also suffer and die in classroom biology experiments and dissection.

Mohandas K. Gandhi once said, “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated”. What, then, does it say about the people of the United States, for allowing the deaths of millions of innocent animals for the benefit of research, that in most cases is not even useful? 100 million animals are killed each year due to animal testing or experimentation (PETA,1). In the past, it was acceptable to use animal testing for scientific research, but now that there are other viable alternatives to the testing of innocent animals, such as in-vitro, stem cell testing, non-incasing imaging techniques, and micro-dosing. Animal testing should only be used in cases where said drug or treatment will treat life-threatening diseases. Animal testing in this day and age is both unnecessary and cruel, as there are multiple alternatives and the most of the time is not useful in human research.

For all of the reasons above, animal testing should be banned. Animal testing leads to animal extinction, animals feeling lonely and hated, and it’s wasteful. Animal testing should be banned, not an

Hundreds of lives and millions of dollars have been wasted on research regarding human prisoners. The information gathered usually can’t be used because it is not reliable, and the tests done did not follow rules that were already in place. When scientists begin to take advantage of prisoners or abuse their rights, their tests become irrelevant. Since prisoners have little to no rights, scientists use them to their own advantage. Many doctors, before the Nuremberg Code and the Hippocratic oath were enforced, made advancements in medicine by these malicious acts. These people were hurt and tortured due to the things that happened before laws were put in place and enforced. Many other problems arose from testing on prisoners and some even continue to affect how studies regarding prisoners are done today.

Animal testing protests have had a long and turbulent history. This argument is one that has been debated since the early 1960’s. It all began when animal rights activists began to take interest in the ethics, or lack thereof, of testing animals for scientific and cosmetic studies. Some of these activists call for researchers to ensure that all of their animals are humanely cared for, while other activists called for the complete end of animal testing. These debates would continue on into the 21st century. Since the inception of this debate there have been factions of radical activists, such as the Animal Rights Miltia, that focus on direct action, performing actions ranging from breaking and entering to arson and car bombings. The issue

Look at the tag of your shirt, where does it say its from? Now, does it say how many people it took to make it or how much time it took? Apply that same logic to when you buy shampoo. Does it say how many animals died when they tested the product? No, it does not. Companies and factories do this for a reason, they want us to be unaware of the facts. Within the next few moments I hope to enlighten you with information you may not know about animal testing.

Every year, animals are subjected to cruel and unnecessary experimentation. According to the USDA, “between 1990-1997 research labs registered with the USDA reported killing at least 12,895,885 dogs, cats, primates, guinea pigs, hamsters, rabbits, bears, armadillos, squirrels, wild rodents and other species. This doesn't include non USDA registered labs” (“Wikianswers”). Lab animals are cut up and tortured to death all in the name of science. How can we as fellow animal species continue to allow this to happen? Animal testing is a callous and barbaric practice. It is unreliable, and there are newer ways to test products that do not involve slaughtering animals. Animals have no voice and cannot defend themselves, so we need to take a stand

“ Animal research and testing has played a part in almost every medical breakthrough of the last century. It has saved hundreds of millions of lives worldwide” Joan Ryan, a former UK home office minister, claims that without animal testing, diseases wouldn’t be cured, or there wouldn’t be any treatments for the disease. Without animal testing certain medicines, cures, and biomedical engineering wouldn’t exist or be as proficient. An estimated 26 million animals have been used to test medical vaccines for diseases. Scientists also use animals to test the toxicity of the vaccines. Animal testing may come off as a rather harsh and inhumane form of study when heard about , but without it, global diseases would be spreading faster and possibly everyone will be infected. Nearly every Nobel Prize winner in Physiology or Medicine since 1901 relied on the information based off of animal research. Since animal testing has been used for research purposes many diseases have been cured and are no longer existent and if not cured then the disease is close to being cured.

“Animals are infected with diseases that they would never normally contract, tiny mice grow tumors as large as their own bodies, kittens are purposely blinded, rats are made to suffer seizures, and primates’ skulls are cut open and electrodes are implanted in them.” states PETA. These are just some of the ways an animal is tortured in testing! The U.S. allows so many laws for animal testing that includes leaving the animal starve, drown them, poison them, shock them, kill them! All with no punishment to the person that completes it. What our world doesn't realize, is that there is another way we can push through this testing, that there are

In the year 2000 a total of over two million animals were used for testing in the United Kingdom. Around the world, animals are used to test products ranging from shampoo to new cancer drugs. This cruel act of animal experimentation should be illegal. The use of animals for testing is not only inhumane, but most animals being used aren’t genetically the same as humans, it is also expensive to do, therefore wasting government dollars.

Animals are used by scientists to develop research for new medications and experiments daily. The Humane Society is working to decrease the use of animals in laboratories by promoting the advancement of affective alternative approaches. Animal testing provides a useful model for treatments of diseases and possible cures. According to the US-based foundation of Biomedical Research, animal testing has made a major advance within the last century- for veterinary health and humans. The practice of using animals for testing has been debated for many decades. Is it morally right or wrong to use animals during experiments? Does federal law ensure that animals used in research are treated humanely? When considering the benefits of animal testing,

At many other labs the owners of them require its scientist to have to kind of animal care certification (Wade). At many labs they have a class that the scientist can take so that they are qualified to work at their lab (Wade). Most labs will also have animal care professionals on their site to take care of the animals. But sometimes, the caretakers aren’t caring for the animals, and they end up suffering from even more pain (Wade).

Animal testing, although a controversial topic, affects a great deal of scientists and the work force in the agriculture field. This topic has proven difficult to communicate to one another about because there are individuals that believe animals should have certain rights and others believe that animals have no rights. Our group wanted to research this topic because we want to gain knowledge and become more understanding toward the people on both sides of the spectrum. Digging more into the research we found that cosmetics, medical use, and food are the most widely used methods for experimentation. With these research fields, people are finding ways to appeal to the ethics of the modern-day consumer.