Pros And Cons Of Animal Testing

An issue that many people debate is if animal testing should remain legal or be banned. Did you know that Europe, which is the world’s biggest cosmetic producer, banned animal testing for cosmetics (11 Facts About Animal Testing)? Sure, animal testing has made some great medical breakthroughs like insulin. There are also downfalls to animal testing. One example is that the experimenters are torturing the animals and the test subjects are painfully tested on. These reasons show that animal testing should be banned, it harms animals, there are better options, and animals and humans are very different.

The first reason is that animal testing harms animals. For example, more than 100 million animals die every year due to chemical, drug, and food tests (Animal Testing 101). This is important information because that is a large amount of animals lost every year. Some of these things that people are testing animals on are not even necessary so animals could be dying for no good reason. Also, many animal tests are cruel procedures some include feeding dogs pesticides, forcing mice to inhale toxic fumes, and dripping corrosive liquid into rabbits’ eyes (Animal Testing 101). In addition, rabbit eyes are very sensitive and dripping chemicals in them can cause major damage and pain to the rabbit.
The third piece of evidence is that animals that are going to be tested on are locked in cages by the testers where there is not much room to roam. All the animals can do is sit and wait for the next painful procedure that will go be tested on them. Animals used in testing lack their natural environment and this can cause stress and can make them to do many weird behaviors. Some behaviors include rocking back and forth, pulling out their own fur, and biting themselves (Animal Testing 101). Usually, when the testing is done or they don’t need the animal anymore, the animal is killed. Others are painfully injured and held in captivity (Murnaghan). This means that animals are basically tortured. They have no chance to escape or fight back in the testing. As you can see, animal testing can be very cruel to animals. Next, is the second reason.

The second reason is that there are better options. The first piece of evidence is that cell culture toxicology has an accuracy rate of 80% to 85% of the time (33 Reasons Why Animal Testing Is Pointless). In other words, there are over a hundred other techniques used to test drugs and some of them are more accurate than animal testing. The second piece of evidence is from the article, “33 Reasons Why Animal Testing Is Pointless”, The Director of Research Defense Society was asked if we hadn’t have used animal testing could we have made as many medical advancements as we would have with it. The man’s reply was “I am sure it could be.” This shows that even medical professionals think that medical achievements could have been made without animal testing. Many non-animal test methods are better than animal testing. Also, they are more humane, cheaper, faster, and more relevant (Animal Testing 101). Although we could have been finding better and more accurate ways to test drugs and other things, we depend on animals for finding how safe a product is. In conclusion, there are way better options out there other than animal testing.

The third and final reason is that animals and humans are very different. First, 2% of different human illnesses are seen in animals and 98% never appear in animals (33 Reasons Why Animal Testing Is Pointless). One can’t help but wonder why we would use animal testing if only 2% of human illnesses ever appear in animals it doesn’t really make sense why we would use animal testing if that’s true. Next, in the United Kingdom 70,000 people are killed or severely disabled every year because of the unexpected reactions to medications. Even though all of these medications have passed animal tests (33 Reasons Why Animal Testing Is Pointless). This means that we can never be positive if a medicine or drug that is tested on animals is safe for humans or not. My final piece of evidence is that there are many examples of drugs tested on animals and not having the same results on humans. One example is Vioxx because it is safe to be in the hearts of dogs, mice, and other lab animals. Though, it caused strokes in up to 139,000 humans (33 Reasons Why Animal Testing Is Pointless). This shows that even though something is safe in animals it can cause very different effects in humans.

While some may argue that animal testing should remain legal because animal testing helps the development of medicine.
It is more true that there are more accurate ways to help the development of medicine other than animal testing. Some evidence to prove this reason is that 70% of drugs that can cause human birth defects in humans are safe in pregnant monkeys (33 Reasons Why Animal Testing Is Pointless).

In conclusion, animal testing should be banned because it harms animals, there are better options, and humans and animals are very different. Animal testing is a horrible process to test drugs and medicines and should be stopped. I dare you to make a
change.