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Thursday, 20 March 2008

Medical research involving animal experiments is detrimental to human health.

Graphic pictures of cats with electrodes clamped to their heads, or monkeys strapped to chairs with their brains cut open, their eyes filled with pain and terror, are enough to upset momentarily even the most hardened person. But most of us put these images out of our mind and accept the situation, because we’re told by the government and medical establishment that such experiments are for our own good.

They insist that without these procedures there will never be cures for the world’s diseases, and that those who oppose animal experiments are extremists holding back ‘progress’.

Yet, despite the supposed stringency of animal tests on drugs deemed safe for human consumption and released onto the market, two million Americans become seriously ill and approximately 100,000 people die every year because of reactions to medicines they were prescribed.

This figure exceeds the number of deaths from all illegal drugs combined. In England, an estimated 70,000 deaths and cases of severe disability occur each year because of adverse reactions to prescription drugs, making this the third most common cause of death.

The Femfatalites.com website reports that in women’s health experiments animals suffer and die in horrific ways. They are mutilated, poisoned, and starved. They have their bones broken, their arteries sewn shut, and their heads chopped off.

They are locked alone in filthy cages, sometimes for years. There are countless examples of animal experiments conducted in the name of women’s health issues: Pregnant rabbits are forced on treadmills to study exercise in pregnancy; rats are starved to study anorexia or have chilli peppers applied to their cervixes to study cervical pain.

As well as animal tests allowing unsafe drugs onto the market, the flip side is that human health is also compromised when drugs which may be beneficial to humans are prevented from being released. We only have to look in our own medicine cabinets for examples.

Today, around 58 billion aspirin per year are sold in worldwide, yet aspirin causes birth defects in mice and rats and results in such extensive blood abnormalities in cats that they can only take 20 per cent of the human dosage every third day. Another painkiller, ibuprofen, causes kidney failure in dogs, even at low doses. Some HIV drugs, used successfully today, were kept off the market for years because of adverse reactions in chimps.

So, the next time you’re asked to contribute money for ‘cancer research’ or ‘heart disease’, find out if the charity utilises animal testing – and if so, boycott it and donate to one which recognises that real medical progress can only be made through studying our own species.

A list of these is available on the website of the Australian Association for Humane Research (AAHR), a non-profit organisation that challenges the use of animals in research on both ethical and scientific grounds and promotes the use of more humane and scientifically-valid non-animal methods of research such as genomics, nanotechnology, epidemiology and computer modelling.

www.aahr.asn.au
www.curedisease.com
www.femfatalities.com

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written by HR , 09 April, 2008

The vast number of animal experiments are not life-saving breakthroughs as many are led to believe. Latest statistics show that over 700,000 are used in teaching each year in Australia -the passing on of knowledge that can be easily achieved through alternative means. Others are genetically modified in attempts to improve the productivity of animals used for food and fibre. Current intensive housing facilities fall very short of fulfilling adequate welfare standards and so the manipulation of these animals to produce an even higher yield is merely a further assault on their already exploited bodies.
Alcohol is fed to sheep and ecstasy to rats to study their reaction despite this information being widely available from human users.
Animal research is a huge business based on vested interests and certainly not to be hailed as the answer to all our medical woes.

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written by Ratfink , 09 April, 2008

Animal experiements are horrible and should be stopped!

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written by Sidonie-Morea Honeyman , 08 April, 2008

Recently I did some animal research and experimentation of mine own in my own home.
In the interests of cost effective methods of killing fleas I utilised my dog's Advantage capsule of flea killer on my cat. A slim margin of 6 kilos weight distinguished between the dosages.
$480 later (12 times the cost of cat Advantage flea treatment) the vet who had assured me it was "impossible to overdose because of the safety margin imposed on Advantage product" diagnosed TOXIC POISONING of my cat. Her motor neuron systems had absorbed, through her spinal cord the flea treatment. Her behaviour was that of a flea: tremors, spasms, hallucinations, a slow painful death for the flea. Now, could some kind advocate of animal experimentation/torture provide a sufficient response and explain the rationalisation of animal experimentation on animals for animal welfare, let alone human welfare.

This field of science (pharmaceutical) suffers from the fate of early experimentation in psychology. Put simply, it's illegal now and known as abuse and manipulation.

Thank you for considering that we are all sentient beings with feelings of pain, joy, isolation and loss.

From Sidonie-Morea Honeypet

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written by skitzycat , 08 April, 2008

I think we need to get back to basics: most diseases would be avoided if people ate the correct foods and looked after their minds and bodies. A healthy vegan diet, exercise and meditation is the very least everybody should be doing. Not only will this help prevent disease but also help our planet to survive and let's not forget alternate forms of medicine such as acupuncture.

But here we are with millions of sick people relying on treatment rather than prevention. We are an ignorant species thinking that animals are here simply for our use. I think in years to come, once it is abolished, we will look back on animal experimentation as a waste of time and resources. (Not to mention how horrifying it is for the animal being tortured) It is simply commonsense to test on the same species you are planning to treat. I understand that people think it is the only way to find cures for disease, but we need re-education. I lost my mother to cancer and still under no circumstances support the use of animals in experiments. I only hope the end to this horrific cruelty comes sooner rather than later.

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written by bemused , 07 April, 2008

It can argued that animal experimentation can be beneficial and has helped find cures for some diseases. That it is a “necessary evil”. However, the number of successes are very small and are a waste of millions of dollars, as well as the suffering of millions of animals.

Just as Celia claims that there are individual differences for humans, the same applies for those animals that are used as test subjects. Animals not only react differently than humans to different drugs, vaccines, and experiments, they also react differently from one another. Furthermore, these animals do not suffer “naturally” from the same conditions as humans, but have the conditions forced upon them. Ignoring the species difference has been and continues to be very costly to human health. One specific example being Thalidomide. This sedative for pregnant women was found to be successful in animal trials, but when released on the market for humans, at least 10,000 children were born with deformities. I wonder if Celia would feel the same if she was of those 10,000 mothers? Or one of the 30,000 people who were rendered blind or suffering from paralysis after taking Colloquial - a drug that passed animal testing.

Celia might like to take a gamble her life on a 1% chance of dying from a drug, rather than taking a 50% chance of dying of cancer. (Is there any such thing as a 50% chance of dying from cancer?) Her own ignorance is evident since she does not realise that over 75% of tested drugs are not for the treatment of diseases etc, but aimed specifically for the pharmaceutical shelves. And out of this 70%, over three-quarters of the ailments can be prevented.

The issue should not be whether animal-based research is valid, but whether it is valid in today’s science. It isn’t. There are a large number of alternatives that do not use animals, are cheaper, as well as more accurate. Such research using human stem cell research, computer modeling, micro fluidics chip, as well as micro dosing have produced far accurate results than those experiments that relied on animals.

Celia, you might liken yourself to a lab rat, but I‘m not one. Perhaps you should take that 1% chance? By doing so, you might just give some validity to that research.

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written by Celia , 06 April, 2008

This article makes a very valid point that animal experimentation can be, and has been, very cruel unnecessarily in some cases. Fortunately, that is why now there is a lengthy ethics approval process that must be completed prior to undertaking any research involving animal experimentation.

It is ridiculous to claim that animal experimentation isn't saving human lives because 100 000 people die every year as a result of adverse side effects of prescription drugs they have taken. This statement just shows the writer's ignorance. When treating people for life-threatening diseases not all drugs can be one hundred percent safe. It is still better to take a drug that has a 1% chance of killing you, than say, taking a 50% chance of dying of cancer. Because each individual is different, not all drugs can be safe for all people, but the rigorous process of first lab studies, then animal testing then human clinical trials that all drugs have to go through before they are made available ensures that they are as safe and effective as possible.

Animal experimentation in medical research is a necessary evil - if researchers weren't able to do studies of safety and efficacy in animals, we would have much less understanding of the effects of new drugs in humans, which would potentially lead to more deaths from adverse drug side effects.

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