Animal Testing

Should Animals be used for Research? Should Animals be used for research? This question is very controversial you’re either for it or against it there’s no sitting on the fence with this one. The pros of animal research are that it helps researchers to find what drugs and treatments help the best, improves human health, and helps ensure safety of drugs. Just reading these 3 pros makes animal research seems needed, but with the good there is always the bad. Some cons to animal research which are the main points that animal activist use in their arguments are animals are killed or kept in captivity, Some substances tested may never be used for anything useful, It is very expensive, and Animals and humans are never exactly the same. For me
labs every year.”(Peta). The majority of these animals are used to further the progression of medicine and human life in the world today. The rest of the animals are used as test dummies for other products that may not even be used. “Hundreds of thousands of animals are experimented on each year in order to figure out the results and dangers of products such as cosmetics, other personal care items, and cleaning supplies” (Peta). 92 percent of experimental drugs that are safe and effective in animals fail in human clinical trials because they are too dangerous or don’t work. Human and animal testing agree only 5-25% of the time, according to Huntingdon Life Sciences these stats show that animal testing is definitely not perfect. The animals that are generally used in research are mice, rats, rabbits, guinea pigs, primates, dogs, cats, cows, fish, and birds. They are bred either in the laboratory or in special companies. Others, like the primates, are captured. There is even a market for lab animals licensed dealers sell animals to research companies. “These animals can come from miserable places such as puppy mills. Some dealers will do pound seizures and even go as far to lure animals in with meat and sedatives. Others will pose as animal control officers and get their animals that way.” (Peta). Scientist and researchers use
Blood samples are taken but in the end the animal is killed and the organs are examined in laboratories, research animals also go through mutations. Mutagenicity is when a chemical or physical agent that causes a change in the animal’s actual genetic make-up and leads to sudden mutations. Many of these mutations will cause cancer in the animals. Some scientists purposely administer a carcinogen, a substance that causes cancer, to form in an animal. The animal is usually in the rodent family and afterwards it is killed at the end of the study. Not only will scientists carry out research on animals but they will also force them to reproduce and they will study the reproductive and development aspects or preform test on their newborns. Pregnant animals and their partners, normally rats and mice, will receive a chemical and they will be murdered before birth and the fetuses will be observed for toxicity reports. The nervous system is also studied in neurotoxicity in animals. Hens and mice are usually the subjects and the must endure doses of chemicals or pesticides over a long period of time and are then killed to examine the nervous system and the effects left on it. For example for the test a substance of some sort will be placed in an animal’s eye and it will then be observed in intervals. The animals may suffer,