Nowadays animal experiments are widely used to develop new medicines and to test
the safety of other products. Some people argue that these experiments should be banned
because it is morally wrong to cause animals to suffer, while others are in favour of them
because of their benefits to humanity.Discuss both views and give your own opinion.
It is true that medicines and other products
are routinely tested on animals before they are
cleared for human use. While I tend towards the
viewpoint that animal testing is morally wrong, I
would have to support a limited amount of animal
experimentation for the development of
medicines.
On the one hand, there are clear ethical arguments
against animal experimentation. To use a
common example of this practice, laboratory mice
may be given an illness so that the
effectiveness of a new drug can be measured.
Opponents of such research argue that humans
have no right to subject animals to this kind of trauma,
and that the lives of all creatures should
be respected. They believe that the benefits to
humans do not justify the suffering caused, and
that scientists should use alternative methods of
research.
On the other hand, reliable alternatives to animal
experimentation may not always be available.
Supporters of the use of animals in medical research
believe that a certain amount of suffering on
the part of mice or rats can be justified if human lives
are saved. They argue that opponents of
such research might feel differently if a member of
their own families needed a medical
treatment that had been developed through the use of
animal experimentation. Personally, I
agree with the banning of animal testing for non-
medical products, but I feel that it may be a
necessary evil where new drugs and medical
procedures are concerned.
In conclusion, it seems to me that it would be
wrong to ban testing on animals for vital medical
research until equally effective alternatives have been
developed.