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The importance of animal testing for medical purposes
The debate over animal testing
The importance of animal testing for medical purposes
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The Controversy of Testing on Animals Facilities that use animals for teaching, experimentations, surgery or testing purposes are known as research facilities. Currently, there are twelve animal research facilities in the state of Alabama ("General Information on Animal Research"). There are many different reasons why animals are used for research. Animals are used to test the products used in cosmetics, for biomedical research, for military defense and food production. Many people including the general public, scientists and government officials do not necessarily agree to the terms and conditions to which these animals are used for testing The optimistic viewpoints for animal testing are that it assists researchers in finding drugs and treatments to advance health and medicine. It is a legal requirement in most countries for drugs and vaccines to be tested in animals to ensure safety. The world would be a different place if animal research for medical purposes were done away with hundreds of years ago. Today many medical treatments have been made possible by animal testing, including cancer and HIV drugs, insulin, antibiotics, vaccines, etc. Animal testing and research is considered very important for improving human health; in fact, the scientific community and some of the general public support animal research. There are also groups of individuals who are against animal testing for cosmetics but they defend animal testing for medicine and the development of new drugs for disease. Incidentally cosmetics companies kill millions of animals every year to test their products. Some of these companies state they test on animals to establish the safety of their products and ingredients for consumers. The Food and Drug Admin... ... middle of paper ... ...esting and research of animals and this is being proven by saving human lives today. Works Cited "Executive Summary." USDA Employee Survey on the Effectiveness of IACUC Regulations (2000): 2. Web. 2 Dec 2009. . "Human Society of the United States." General Information on Animal Research. 2009. The Human Society of the United States, Web. 6 Dec 2009. Sewell, Anna. Web. 6 Dec 2009. . "The Animal Welfare Act: An Overview." United States Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (2006): n. pag. Web. 2 Dec 2009. . Twchy, Mike. Cartoon. Washington Post 14 Jun. 2005
United States Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Library. Animal Welfare Act. 8 April 2014. 14 April 2014.
She sits alone in a threadbare, chilly, metal cage. Her eyes dart around wondering when the next torture will commence. If the testing fails to kill her, the stress definitely will. Entering is the doctor who plans to perform an eye irritancy test. The rabbit’s eyes will be held open with clips for at least three days if she survives that long (“Frequently Asked Questions”). Similarly, if these procedures would be performed on a human, they would be considered illegal. Yet, scientists continue to make harmless animals suffer incessantly. Annually, countless animals are abused in American test labs; however, alternative practices should be implemented in order to participate in worldwide trade, save innocent lives, and provide more accurate data.
...ted States. Department of Agriculture. Animal Care Blue Book. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Animal Welfare Act and Animal Welfare Regulations. United States Department of Agriculture. Web. 23 Dec. 2013. .
The use of animals to test cosmetics is introduced in their article as well. The authors quote a vast amount of credible sources from prestigious universities such as Princeton and from well known animal rights group such as PETA. I will use this as my main source of information.
In many parts of the world, animals are being used in laboratories are still suffering and dying to test cosmetics. In
Over the past couple of years many companies of these cosmetic products released that they are against animal testing including LUSH Fresh Handmade Cosmetics, The Body Shop, and many others. There are still companies that still do test with animals; over 250 on PETA’s website. A large percent of these are well-known companies such as Johnson & Johnson, Estee Lauder, Procter & Gamble, L’Oreal, and others that may surprise the consumer. The majority of these companies are producing the same products yet using different animal testing results. This causes the number of test subjects to be substantially larger than what is needed. The number of tests being conducted could be reduced if these companies either become anti animal testing or share results with other companies. This idea might seem like a long-shot since sharing information with their competitors seems ridiculous. If you take a step back from looking at each individual company, you’ll see that they are all conducting similar tests with similar products. Sharing results of these tests with other companies potentially selling similar products, with the same ingredients, will result in a large drop in animal testing (Search for Cruelty-Free
In my opinion, I think that if there is an alternative way in getting the same test results, then animal testing should be avoided. If the use of animals is required in order to obtain more knowledge of medicine then I believe that the welfare of the animals should be a priority of the researchers and if the well-being of the subjects is compromised then measures should be taken to correct these mistakes. I am not an advocate of abusing animals in order to advance research, but I do believe that the use of animals in research studies is extremely beneficial. Without the use of animal testing researchers would not have as many answers and solutions to problems that we have, such as sickness.
Throughout history, beginning as early as 500 BC, animals have been used to test products that will later be utilized by humans (“Animal Testing” 4), what isn’t publicly discussed is the way it will leave the animals after the process is done. Many innocent rabbits, monkeys, mice, and even popular pets such as dogs are harmed during the testing application of cosmetics, medicine, perfumes, and many other consumer products (Donaldson 2). Nevertheless, there are many people whom support the scandal because "it is a legal requirement to carry out animal testing to ensure they are safe and effective” for human benefit (Drayson). The overall question here is should it even be an authorized form of experimentation in the United States, or anywhere else? The fact of the matter is that there are alternatives to remove animals out of the equation for good (“Alternatives” 1). They are cheaper, and less invasive than the maltreatment of the 26 million innocent animals that are subjected to the heartlessness of testing each year (“Animal Testing” 4). All in all, due to the harsh effects of animal testing, it should be treated as animal cruelty in today’s society.
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 brutally hurts them but it also denies the animals the rights they have.
At this moment, millions of animals know cold cages in laboratories as home, but why? Some of these animals are subjects for medical research purposes, while others are used out of pure curiosity and to test different products. Majority of these animals are used in painful experiments and are left in agony. While many of them die, a few animals survive, but these unfortunate ones wish they could be put out of their misery as well. Although scientists have resources they could use to lower the pain each animal endures and even alternatives of their test subjects, millions of innocent creatures are still suffering. The fact that animals are still used when animal experimentation is avoidable and not necessary makes animal testing unethical.
"Do Cosmetic Companies Still Test on Live Animals?." Scientific American Global RSS. N.p., 6 Aug. 2009. Web. 27 Apr. 2014.
Without animal testing, products would be based on theory. No one would want to use something, which may damage the eyes, be poisonous, cancerous, and cause birth defects. Animals used in testing are not from the endangered species list; many of the types of animals used are killed each year by rat or mouse traps, animal control, exterminators, and animal shelters. Animal testing reaps great benefits, such as finding effective drugs to combat disease, improve surgical procedures, and make products safer. When someone goes to the store and buys a product, or is prescribed medication, they don’t have to worry if the product is safe to use, nor should they.
Johnson. It is the only Federal Law in the United States that regulates the treatment of animals in research and exhibition. This act requires all animal dealers to be registered and licensed, and if they break any of the provisions of the Animal Welfare Act, they will be fined $1,000. The act was amended eight times (1970, 1976, 1985, 1990, 2002, 2007, 2008, and 2013). All these different times that it was amended, more and more animals were brought justice and helped from being mistreated and poorly taken care of. August 31, 2015, the announcement of the Federal tracking of cruelty crimes changes, have brought forth new statistics of animal abuse. 64.5% (1,212) of the crimes were dog related, 18% (337) were cats, and 25% (470) were other animals. Just about one million animals are abused or killed yearly in the U.S., and if caught are fined under the Animal Welfare Act of 1966. The Animal Welfare Act has granted lab research and use of animals, it regulates care and the use of animals in research, but excludes cold-blooded animals, and limited protection on other animals such as mice, rats, and birds bred for research. Conservative estimates indicate that over 25 million animals are used annually for animal research. The U.S.D.A is in charge of enforcing the AWA (Animal Welfare Act). The USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) Animal Care program administers
However, some people believe that animal testing is beneficial in various ways. Those people that see animal testing as beneficial think that without animals, medical developments would not be where it is today. (Animal Testing) It has helped us to find and ensure the safety of drugs and treatments to improve health and medicine such as; open heart surgery, organ transplants, effective insulin, vaccines for deadly diseases and others. It is the most accurate way to learn the effects of substances in a living body. (Animal Testing) Another reason they see it benefi...
Animal testing hasn’t been beneficiary towards any scientific breakthrough or discovery. Elias Zourhini says, “Animal testing has been useless” he is one of the main people who are strongly making a push to try and stop animal testing as a whole. “There have been thousands of dead and injured animals in the past years or so and there has been any reward or safety ensured because of these animals. Animals have been being used for testing for many years now, and especially now, the number of animals that are being used to be experimented on are extremely high. However, you may not know that laboratories aren’t required to publish how many animals they used or how many experiments conducted. Maybe that would help to find out especially what animals need to be strongly protected against testing. “Every laboratory should publish an annual statement setting forth plainly the number and kind of experiments and the methods of conducting them” (Gould qd. in Leffingwell 211). This would help many things and especially organizations that are protesting, to give reasons and facts about testing. Animals are used and then unaccounted for. Truly, you may never know h...