can we stop animal testing? its harming animals.?

Question

i am a person who is against animal testing. its not helping the animals..just killing them visit peta2.com for info.

Answer 1

How about all the humans who are helped by the drugs that are tested on animals? What would you have them do when the drugs they need can't be developed because they can't be tested on animals?

Answer 2

I think you're missing the point. The purpose of animal testing isn't to help ANIMALS, it's to help PEOPLE.

I don't expect you to read through this, as many people affiliated with Peta are not known for their objectivity when reasoning these things out.

If you would really like to halt the progress of medical science, then go right on ahead and stop animal testing. There will be no more nice new medicines to combat an ever-changing plethora of diseases and disorders which afflict humanity.

If you've ever taken any kind of medication, you've benefited from animal research. While it is unfortunate, it is something that must continue to benefit all of mankind. I do agree that testing on most animals is not necessary as accurate data cannot be collected due to the vast differences in physiology. If anything testing could be restricted to primates that share similar physiologies to humans. This would give scientists more accurate data to determine the possible effects that a new drug might have on the human body.

Do not think me an unfeeling monster. This is just the truth of medicine. Sure, we could give people drugs without testing them, but that in itself has negative moral implications, as we have no idea what a drug may do to someone.

Scenario: A brand new drug has been developed to treat, oh let's say AIDS. The drug isn't tested on any test subjects (or animals) and is widely distributed to AIDS-infected patients. In their haste to release a new drug to combat this horrible illness, scientists and doctors are unable to determine that the drug has a terrible side-effect. It raises blood pressure in 25% of patients so high that it causes arterial rupturing. In a matter of days, scores of patients are left dead, others brain damaged from blood vessels rupturing in their brain, and many others left in worse shape than before taking the medication. Would you want to be the one to explain to their families that their loved ones had to die so a few animals could live? Had the drug been tested, its negative effects could have been assessed and the drug likely would have never been approved for distribution.

I cannot say the same, however, for cosmetic testing. There are a wide variety of testing methods for cosmetics which don't involve animal suffering. It is, however, cheaper in most cases for the cosmetic companies to test on animals, and therefore many still resort to inhumane testing procedures.

Answer 3

we can't stop it in one day, but we can over time. I hate animal testing too and hate anything that harms them (im a vegetarian).
To help stop it for good you can sign all the petitions, send letters and get everyone you know to do the same. You can also make flyers and teach other people about animals testing (state unknown facts like that animals testing doesn't keep unsafe object out of stores).
I've done a lot of this and it has worked. Just don't give up.

Answer 4

It is certainly a hard question. Pharmaceutical companies cannot randomly introduce new products without testing them thoroughly - when I was born, way back when, my mum was treated with a drug during the pregnancy. The doctor did not choose thalidomide at that time, for which I am eternally grateful, but many babies born around the same time were forever horribly disabled because of insufficient testing.
I do feel strongly about this issue, I am not keen on animal testing, but I would rather have a lab rat die than my own child.
The only solution I have found which gives me peace of mind is to volunteer to be a subject for research tests when you see an opportunity.

Answer 5

There are not enough humans volunteering to be used as test subjects for the many medicines we need to make to save lives, to be able to do without animals for test purposes. And in many places it is illegal anyway, because people would stupidly risk their lives to be tested, or get themselves infected with fatal diseases to get free medical care.

Bottom line: I value my own species above all others. (That includes you, by the way.) That’s the struggle for survival. That’s evolution. Who are we to go against evolution? The minute we start to think we are no better than other species, we are ready to become extinct ourselves.

24 DEC 06, 0320 hrs, GMT

Answer 6

i wish we could. but the thing is, if we stop animal testing, we cant be sure that the meds we take are safe for us. however, i would think that animal testing on cosmetics should be outlawed, why would someone want to risk the life of a fellow organisim, just to look better?

Answer 7

I agree with you. But we can't stop animal testing coz in most countries, animal testing is legal as long as it got legal documents and such, its stated in their law. It is even legal to kill or destroy an animal that was used for research or animal testing!its really cruel and i'm totally against it.

Answer 8

Do you have any idea how many diseases have been cured by using animals for testing? Have you considered that you may not have lived to have an opinion on animal testing if we had not conquered smallpox or other diseases? You may have already been saved by the very thing you protest. Would you deny that advantage to others?

Answer 9

I agree that animal testing is inhuman and wrong, but until scientists can find human subjects to spray, smear, dust, and whatnot with chemicals that are potentially harmful, we won't see the end of animal testing.

Answer 10

Regardless of what other ignorant and uneducated people have said responding to your question, here are the facts: More lives could be saved and suffering stopped by educating people on the importance of avoiding fat and cholesterol, the dangers of smoking, reducing alcohol and other drug consumption, exercising regularly, and cleaning up the environment than by all the animal tests in the world. You do not settle whether an experiment is justified or not by merely showing that it is of some use. The distinction is not between useful and useless experiments, but between barbarous and civilized behavior. There are some medical problems that can probably only be cured by testing on unwilling people, but we don’t do it because we recognize that it would be wrong. We need to extend this same concern to other living, feeling beings, regardless of what species they may be. Medical historians have shown that improved nutrition, sanitation, and other behavioral and environmental factors—not anything learned from animal experiments—are responsible for the decline in deaths since 1900 from the most common infectious diseases and that medicine has had little to do with increased life expectancy. Many of the most important advances in health are attributable to human studies, including the development of anesthesia; bacteriology; germ theory; the stethoscope; morphine; radium; penicillin; artificial respiration; antiseptics; the CAT, MRI, and PET scans; the discovery of the relationships between cholesterol and heart disease and between smoking and cancer; the development of x-rays; and the isolation of the virus that causes AIDS. Animal testing played no role in these and many other developments. The role of animal studies in the development of many treatments has been exaggerated and twisted to fit the goals of those who promote animal experimentation. For example, the development of the polio vaccine involved two separate bodies of work—the in vitro or non-animal studies, which were awarded the Nobel Prize, and the subsequent animal experiments in which close to 1 million animals were killed and which the Nobel committee refused to recognize as anything more than wasteful. Early polio studies on animals misled researchers about the route of infection and delayed the development of a vaccine for decades. It’s impossible to say where we would be today if we had refused to experiment on animals, because throughout medical history, very few resources have been devoted to non-animal research methods. We do know that animal experiments frequently give misleading results and many believe we’d probably be better off if we hadn’t relied on them and ignored avenues of research more relevant to humans, including epidemiological and cell research. The choice isn't between animals and people! There's no guarantee that drugs are safe just because they've been tested on animals. Because of the physiological differences between humans and other animals, results from animal tests cannot be accurately extrapolated to humans, leaving us vulnerable to exposure to drugs that can cause serious side effects. Drugs that sicken or kill animals don't always prevent a drug from being marketed. So much evidence has accumulated about differences in the effects that chemicals have on animals and humans that government officials often do not act on findings from animal studies. In the last two decades, many drugs, including phenacitin, Eferol, Oraflex, Suprol, and Selacryn, were taken off the market after causing hundreds of deaths and/or injuries. In fact, more than half the drugs that the Food and Drug Administration approved between 1976 and 1985 were either removed from the market or relabeled because of serious side effects. If the pharmaceutical industry switched from animal experiments to sophisticated non-animal tests, we would have greater protection, not less. In addition to saving the lives of countless animals, alternatives to animal tests are efficient and reliable. Non-animal methods usually take less time to complete, can be conducted at a fraction of the cost of the animal experiments that they replace, and are not plagued with species differences that make extrapolation difficult or impossible. Effective, affordable, and humane research methods include studies of human populations, volunteers, and patients as well as sophisticated in vitro, genomic, and computer-modeling techniques. People who have responded in favor of animal testing need to do their research before opening their mouths.