Scientific Validity in Animal Testing: An Examination of Perspectives

Introduction

Each year many innocent worldwide animals are taken away from their natural habitats. Animals are taken away by force to be put into laboratories to be tested on many company products, from medication to cosmetics, causing animals pain, suffering, distress, or lasting harm. This has been around for centuries.

Body

The Ethical Dilemma of Animal Testing

In the late nineteenth century, the number of animals that were used in tests increased forward with the number of tests. Animal testing causes a lot of pain, and it’s given to animals to improve human lives should be rejected. For the benefits, it is something over the suffering that the animals should not have to go through, and it is not so safe. The article The Experiment Is on Us: Science of Animal Testing Thrown into Doubt” by Pat Dutt and Jonathan Latham and the documentary “Bye, Bye guinea pig” from Java film exclusive both talk about how animals are being tested for hundreds of thousands of consumer products. However, the documentary uses a strong emotional appeal that makes the subject more persuasive.

Scientific Validity in Question

The article “The Experiment Is on Us: Science of Animal Testing Thrown into Doubt” by Pat Dutt and Jonathan Latham was published in 2013. In this article, the authors argue that not all animal testing is safe; according to Kristie Sullivan, Director of Regulatory Testing Issues at the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, “about 90% of all pharmaceuticals tested for safety in animals fail to reach the market, or are quickly pulled from the market”. Everyday products, from soft drinks and baby foods to paints, gardening products, cosmetics, and shampoos, contain numerous synthetic chemicals such as dyes, active ingredients, or contaminants. Official assurances of the safety of these chemicals are based on animal experiments that use rabbits, mice, rats, and dogs. But new results from a consortium of researchers published in the Proceedings of the National Academy say it may be worthless.

The author Jonathan Latham argues that “medical failures affect the unwell, chemical toxins have potential repercussions for everyone.” The main point is if animals are not useful predictors of important disease responses in humans, it is unlikely they are useful as test subjects for toxicological safety. The lack of accordance in chemicals found in certain products, incorporated into food, and otherwise spread throughout the environment is untested. “We are not protecting humans,” says Pat Dutt, “even a National Academy study agrees that many toxicological tests are not human-relevant.”

Conclusion

In the documentary “Bye Bye Guinea, Pig” by the filmmaker Aude Favre, Kanopy was published in 2016. In the documentary, it argues that “animals deserve more than being tortured in labs.” Animals are being tested by so many products before humans get to use the products, which is not a great thing for animals. In order to see if a product works or if it causes some kind of reaction, animals are the first ones to experience the effects. The documentary attempts to convince the audience that animal testing is dangerous and not safe for all animals. The thesis of this is to stop animals from being tested.

“In 2013, a European law banned the use of animal testing products”. By the filmmaker Aude Favre, Kanopy was published in 2016. Away from the ethical issues of the purpose exposing physical pain can form suffering in large numbers of creatures. Animal tests provide little understanding of how chemicals behave in the body and, in many cases, do not think about the real world of human reactions. As in health, scientists are questioning the relevance of research for human diseases in the laboratory by creating symptoms in other animal species.

References

1. Dutt, P., & Latham, J. (2013). The Experiment Is on Us: Science of Animal Testing Thrown into Doubt. Independent Science News.
2. Favre, A. (Director). (2016). Bye Bye Guinea Pig [Documentary]. Kanopy.