Medical Testing on Animals: Is it Right? - Academic Paper

It is estimated that 26 million animals are used in the United States for medical testing. The government fund the ability for animals to be experimented on, so they can find cures to diseases without touching the human race. Although animal testing gives humans advances in finding cures for diseases, medical testing on animals should not be allowed.

Compared to human beings, the body of an animal makes them poor test subjects for medical testing. To start off, humans and animals are very different beings who react to things differently so causing them to be tested for a reaction similar to humans is not right. For instance, putting them in a place where they are normally not at and forcing reactions of a completely different being to see if it is safe for that being shows that they should not be doing that in the first place. As stated in the article, “Animal Testing is Bad Science”, “Taking healthy beings from a completely different species, artificially inducing a condition that they would never normally contract, keeping the animal unnatural and stressful environment, and trying to apply the results to naturally occurring diseases in human beings is dubious at best” (Animal Rights). Animals do not quite have the same body type as humans causing the body itself to react differently to things. Going off of just the animal results for humans instead of understanding both does not give the results justice. Not to mention that the government is just wasting lives because animals are not the same as humans. Animal experimentation has wasted lives with trying to cure diseases by testing it out on both animals and humans. It is pretty much a waste of resources (Animal Rights). The government is scared to harm the human race just to figure out how to cure diseases so they go to animals which are close in makeup but not close enough for the results to align. Finally, even huge groups of people who support animal experimentation admit that it does not always work. As the article states, “The AAVS declares that experimentation on animals is not a valid means of testing treatments for human disease. The AAVS maintains that animal studies do not reliably predict human outcomes” (Scientific Research). The outcomes of these treatments are unknown when they test on animals and not humans. They are looking for how humans react to diseases and how they need to be cured, not animals. Animals being test subjects are putting humans in danger because even from human to human, the reactions are not the same but compare humans to animals, the reactions are totally different which is why they are seen as bad test subjects.

Countless types of drugs have been labeled as “safe” after being tested by animals that have killed humans. To go into more detail, how animals’ bodies react to medicine is very different from how humans react, so they should not be compared. For instance, it is not predictable. It has been shown that comparing drug side effects from both humans and animals shows that it is less predictive than tossing a coin five times to get more heads than tails (Archibald). Animal testing results do not always match up with how they want it to go for humans for that sole probability factor. To go off of that, with the probability factor being low it leads to bad complications. As the book states, “Arthritis drug Vioxx, withdrawn from the global market in September 2004, appeared to be safe and even beneficial to the heart in animals but caused as many as 140,000 heart attacks and strokes in the U.S. alone” (Archibald 158). Many humans were killed by drugs that were deemed “safe” by animals. Drugs that in the first place were supposed to help, not harm. Finally, symptoms do not match up from humans to animals. The article states, “Diseases that are artificially induced in animals in a laboratory are never identical to those that occur naturally in human beings. And because animal species differ from one another biologically in many significant ways, it becomes even more unlikely that animal experiments will yield results that will be correctly interpreted and applied to the human condition in a meaningful way” (Medical Testing). Medicine changes symptoms from person to person so imagine the difference between humans and animals. Living things both with different bodies and different reactions to stuff. Just because it is labeled safe for animals, does not mean that it is safe for humans as a whole.

According to an analysis of government data, the National Institutes of Health spends between $12 billion and nearly $14.5 billion on animal testing every year. To go off of that, that means animal experimentation is highly expensive. For instance, companies and charities fund animal testing underneath the public’s noses. Charities like the March of Dimes, the American Cancer Society, gain countless others fund animal experimentation. Many of the U.S. government’s tax money that loyal citizens pay go to experimentation but mainly animal experimentation (Medical Testing). Charities and the federal government fund animal experimentation so cures for diseases are found. To go off of that, the federal government is one of the biggest funders. As the article states, “Every year in the United States, animal experimentation gobbles up billions (including 40% of all research funding from the U.S. National Institutes of Health), and more than $1 trillion is spent on healthcare” (Animal Rights). Through taxes and other ways, the government gain funding for medical testing. People do not understand how much is truly spent and what they do to make sure the medicine is “safe” for humans. Finally, the expensiveness for medical testing on animals just causes companies to find it more enticing. The following article states, “Approximately 47% of NIH-funded research involves experimentation on non-human animals, and in 2009, the NIH budgeted nearly $29 billion for research and development” (Medical Testing). Take into account that not everything is going to medical testing but at the same time, the number is abnormally high. This shows that animal experimentation funding is causing it to be shown as expensive because the human race just wants cures for all of the diseases that affect them.

Regardless of animal testing being a bad thing, it has helped the human race find cures for diseases that they never thought they would find before. However, just because it is helping the human race find cures, that does not mean it is entirely good. For instance, the animals that are tested on are treated badly. Regardless of the fact that medical testing can cure diseases, it does not mean that animals should be treated like they are something less than what they are. In medical testing, they are perceived as “models” for how medicine should react (Animal Research). Things like “Purpose Bred” animals are made for research and do not cause harm to outside animals but with that, those animals are treated as if they are something less. With that, animals are being put through so much sometimes causing the results do not match as much as it would have. As the article describes, “It is wrong to treat animals as objects for the purpose of scientific research and to cause them pain and suffering. It is not possible to use animal outcomes to predict results in humans” (Animal Research). Animals are being treated terribly just to help the human race figure out the cure to diseases which are not right. Finally, animals die daily just for the benefit of medical testing. To give an example from the article, “Scientists cut open live animals to see how bodies work, they poison animals to see how their bodies react, they test cosmetics on them and more. These animals often die excruciatingly painful deaths after having lived their entire lives in isolation trapped in tiny cages with minimal stimuli” (Animal Experimentation is). Animals die alone just so scientists can test on them to see if they can cure diseases. Animal testing is said by the public that it is good and needs to keep going, but if people dig deep they can see the ugly truth behind this horrifying scientific act.

To wrap it up, Medical testing on animals should not be allowed even though it advances the human race along with curing diseases. Society turns a blind eye when animals are dying everyday, when their tax money is going to horrific form of experimentation, when “safe” drugs are killing them. What can the human race do to make what animal experimentation really is shown to the public?