Is Animal Research Still Necessary?

Animal testing and ethical issues

An undercover investigation performed by an investigator from the British Unit Against Vivisection, or BUAV, gave as a result a video portraying tests performed in puppies and kittens, in an animal facility of a very important laboratory, Merck Sharp and Dohme. In the video, puppies and kittens are used for experimentation and are separated from their mothers at a very early age. They also mention that the moms are sacrificed, after being used just as breeding machines. This video was widely spread, and as expected, it caused feelings of distress and waves of outrageousness in almost every individual that watched it.

Animal testing and cruelty go together 

I say almost every individual because I am tempted to think that there were a few people that did not react this way. But, who wouldn’t? Animal testing is a very delicate issue and it is far from changing anytime soon. And this is completely understandable, because in the end, animals are being bred and used for tests that involve keeping them in confined spaces and exposing them to substances or studies that could or could not cause harm.

Even journalists writing about animal research and covering stories like the one presented by the BUAV tend to promote wrong concepts as far as animal research goes, increasing misinformation around this topic. 

Animal research is necessary

When developing treatments and cures for both, animal and human diseases, it is imperative first to study the disease, how it develops and causes damage to certain tissue or organ, in order to identify possible therapeutic targets for this illness. Diseases have to be studied even before their symptomatology is detectable, which most of the times is not possible, because patients that are diagnosed with a certain illness are usually in the middle or the final stages of the disease.

See Also: Humanization Of Animals In The Name Of Medical Research Needs New Rules To Support Ethics

Once researchers have detected a “weak ankle” to the disease, a drug or treatment can be developed. Drugs have to be tested in order to secure their safety and effectiveness. They can be first tested in cellular models, but these models are restrictive in terms of possible interactions of the drug with other organs, specially the liver and kidneys. Because of this, research needs to be escalated into an animal model before it can be tested in humans. It is impossible to test a drug in humans before securing its safety in an animal model, as harsh as it sounds.

Laws On Animal Research 

What you may not know is that animal research is strongly regulated, both locally and worldwide. It is not possible for research laboratories or companies to conduct animal testing without fulfilling certain criteria. These regulations are designed by experts in the area and are enforced by local governments.

Strict regulations to ensure humane treatment

For instance, in the U.K., researchers that need to handle animals for experimentation are required to have a license. This license is approved after a thorough analysis of the research project, which should include the reasons to use an animal model and not a bacterial or cellular model, for example, the number of animals that are necessary for the study and the impact of the study.

Once licenses are approved, the scientific team is obliged to report periodically their achievements to the governmental institution in charge of these matters. 

The three R's campaign

These laws certainly challenge researchers' skills, because they need to design their experiments in such an efficient way that the least number of animals are used and still, results obtained can be significant for the study that is being performed.  

Sometimes, scientists are portrayed as heartless and without a bit of care regarding animals that are used for experimentation, but this is not the case. Scientists are always trying to develop new models that can if not replace, at least avoid as much as possible the use of animals for experimentation. 

See Also: Green Glowing Cats Might Help In Hiv Research

So, as you can see, animal research ethics go beyond what a video can portray. Without animal experimentation we would not have all the medicines and treatments that we have nowadays for even the simplest disease. We would be dying of treatable illnesses and epidemics would be part of our daily life. Hopefully, animal experimentation will slowly become more and more unnecessary with time, but meanwhile, be sure that both scientists and governments do everything that is in their hands to respect animal rights and give them a humane treatment.