No one relishes using animals for experimentation, but the medical community has long insisted that such research helps develop potentially life-saving drugs and treatments. Is this justification compelling enough to continue using animals for medical research?
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Can Medical Research on Animals be Justified?
I'd rather see a rat die than a person
The first argument that PETA uses to argue against animal testing is that many of the drugs tested on animals and moved into human trials end up being harmful to humans. What they don't mention is how many drugs are tested on animals that don't move onto human trials because they're determined to be dangerous.
Here's an overly simplified example. Bleach certainly kills the AIDS virus. Test tube trials would show this is absolutely true. We clearly don't want to inject bleach into somebody to see if it kills them too. We test it on animals first because we'd rather see a dozen dead rats than a dozen dead people.
Computer models and lab tests can certainly help eliminate many dangerous chemicals but in the end there are many that seem fine in the computer but just don't work. I'd rather see a rat die than a person.
- State of Reason
August 6, 2008 1:18PM
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