Animal testing?

Question

Can animal testing ever be justified even if it found a cure to cancer?

Answer 1

Animal testing can never be justified. How do we know that the medicine we test on animals will work for humans. Penicillin would never have been discovered if it was tested on Guinea Pigs because it makes them ill. There are much better ways to test medicine without testing on animals.
Animal testing is selfish as the animals do not use this medicine and killed to help us. Is this fair?

Answer 2

I feel that it can, but NOT the way it is being done now. All animal testing (for cancer anyway) has ever done is abuse animals to see what drugs make cancer patients live a little longer. Have you noticed that there is not cure for cancer? We've been doing 'research' on some types since the 70's and we've made NO progress on finding a cure.

Answer 3

Hell yes! There's nothing irritates me quite so much as people who would deny life (or a better quality of life) to potentially millions of others all around the world because they're a touch on the squeemish side. Think about it logically - either your kid, parent, sibling or friend dies, or a lab rat does. You'd always pick the rat. You'd always pick a monkey even. Or a thousand rats or monkeys etc. Okay, so you might well feel badly for the animal(s) who die in the course of research, but it would take a really skewed viewpoint to deny medical progress on the grounds that some animals suffer in the short term.

That said, the testing of cosmetics etc on animals is an utterly abhorant idea, and the unjustifiable suffering caused makes me sick to my stomach...

Answer 4

It all starts with what you believe animals are. For those that see them as furry people, I know I cannot convince them it can ever be justified.

I be live people do hold a special place on this planet. God gave them us and we are at the top of the food chain. whether its for nourishment, verifying the safety of products or finding a cure for cancer, we are justified in using them.

Should we be cruel for no reason? No!

Do I want them to find out that a new mascara cause blindness by testing it on a dog rather than on a person? Yes!

Answer 5

Certainly. We certainly can't test people. How many would volunteer for such research if it were ethically permitted? still not many.

A dicey issue but we have to realise that one of the main problems facing man and even killing at a faster rate than HIV is cancers.

The nature of the diseases mean that the only feasible way to test treatments and drugs are animals which would give us an idea of the effect in humans.

Not the most pleasant way to do things but the most practical for human benefit.

Answer 6

I am totally against animal testing, particularly as it appears there are non-animal tests available which are just as, if not MORE effective.

The reason most people don't know about them is because our government refuses to fund any serious money into these alternatives, as they have vested interests in the companies who profit from animal testing.

We have been cutting live animals open for hundreds (maybe thousands) of years, and for what? There is still no cure for AIDS, Cancer, Parkinsons etc... it is the 21st century and it is high time we progressed in science without causing any more unnecessary suffering to these creatures.

http://www.huntingdonsucks.com/gallery.html - the reality of animal testing.. be warned this is very graphic! Not for children or those of a faint heart.

Answer 7

A lot of people feel animals should have the same rights as humans, and so shouldn't be used for testing. These tend to be city people who identify with their pets.

People who live in the country or on a farm, have a very different view of animals. They see them more in the way they have been seen for thousands of years, i.e. a meat resource. They don't see them as equals.

Two very different views. One group can justify it the other can't.

Answer 8

All this hullabaloo about the evils of animal testing seems rather hypocritical when we consider that we humans have always depended on creatures of the lower species for our survival: animals are reared or caught in the wild and slaughtered just to provide us with meat. Do we now consider it wrong to eat the flesh of other creatures lower than ourselves? Of course, the anti-testers have a point, in that the pain suffered by these creatures in some of these tests can be excruciating. But unless we all want to become vegetarians, there's no point crying hoarse about animal testing

Answer 9

Yes, I worked for a while for a drug development company, we used to use animal models to create antibodies, these were then used to help understand and development of drugs at a later stage. Every project we ran had to have approval from the Home Office, we had to evaluate the potential (if any) suffering of the animal against the potential gains to humanity. We had to work to protocols of minimal severity, S/C injections were perfered etc. Our work helped towards new drugs and thus helped save lifes, what we did was occupy a welfare high ground by putting the intrest of the animals at the top of our concearns, thus making a difficut area much more humane and etical. This testing is necassary and fundemental to aid research and development, at the end of the day if you, your child or family are ill and there is a way to make them better would you not take it?

Answer 10

Well, you got to get the balance right now.

Is mankind more essential for the world or is 'animal kind' more essential for the world. Which is created for which.

VERY controversial question you've asked. I think that you will not have your answer by the end of the discussion because there is really 2 sides to this.

People will argue that it is very cruel to do animal testing even if it benefits humankind. Then if animals are created for man to use, this is not the way to use them.

Told ya, very controversial, right?