Affirmative Arguments:
1. Their poor reliability (more reliable alternatives) 2. Unnecessary cruelty to animals (causing controversy)
Reliability/Alternatives
Reliability
Cigarettes were considered safe because smoking-related cancer is almost impossible to reproduce in non-human animals. The primary purpose of medical research is to promote human health, and the most direct research methods focus on the study of human populations, individuals, and tissues. Animal research has been used merely as an alternative method when study of humans is deemed impractical or unethical. In addition to the ethical issues, the profound differences in anatomy, physiology, and biochemistry between humans and animals make animals poor models for humans. Results from research on animals cannot be accurately extrapolated to humans and are poor predictors for how humans will respond to drugs, treatments, or diseases.
This process has been regularly criticized by doctors and scientists, who insist that animal testing is unscientific, erroneous, and a danger to human health. Animal experiments can be misleading. An animal 's response to a drug can be different than a human 's. The stress that the animals endure in labs can affect experiments, making the results meaningless. Animal tests do not protect the consumer from the sale of dangerous drugs and substances because it is impossible to reliably predict human reactions in animals. There are countless biological variations between all species of animals.
According to Dr. Arie Brecher, M.D., head pediatrician in Holon, Israel,
"Animals are completely different from humans, and no animal species can serve as an experimental model for a human. Each animal has a genetic code of its own and [is] characteristically unique in each species. For this reason, a method that is based on the similarity between the species, while there are differences, and
Cited: N/A. "Educational Resources about Animal Research." Foundation For Biomedical Research. Jan. 2005. Washington, DC. 12 Nov. 2005. N/A. "Why do scientists use animals in research?" American Physiological Society Homepage. Nov. 2005. Bethesda, MD. 15 Nov 2005.