Should new drugs be tested on both animals and humans?

Answer 1

• Absolutely not! There is no correlation between animals and humans and more often than not these so-called tests have proved wrong and many drugs have been taken off the market. Scientists will babble on in theory, but pinned down cannot positively give a good argument that animals should be tested for human medications. Humanity is the key here and since pig skin has been introduced as the human body accepting it (for burn patients to accident victims) and many other organs from certain animals it should be done with the utmost dignity and painless regarding the animal! Unfortunately, most scientists are too into becoming famous and too into the outcome of their experiments to care if the animal is out of pain before, during and after (if the animal survives at all) and that's not acceptable. There is also the aspect of how much money the scientists are given for the actual experimentation's and they sure aren't going to waste it on deadening the pain regarding the animals.

• Animal testing is necessary, because animals make good research subjects. Animals are biologically similar to humans. They are susceptible to many of the same health problems, and they have short life-cycles so they can easily be studied throughout their whole life-span or across several generations. In addition, scientists can easily control the environment around the animal (diet, temperature, lighting, etc.), which would be difficult to do with people. However, the most important reason why animals are used is that it would be wrong to deliberately expose human beings to health risks in order to observe the course of a disease.

• Animals are used in research to develop drugs and medical procedures to treat diseases. Scientists may discover such drugs and procedures using alternative research methods that do not involve animals. If the new therapy seems promising, it is tested in animals to see whether it seems to be safe and effective. If the results of the animal studies are good, then human volunteers are asked to take part in a clinical trial. The animal studies are done first to give medical researchers a better idea of what benefits and complications they are likely to see in humans.

• There are a lot of correlations between animals and humans including homologous genes, neurology, and molecular biological. This all comes from having a common ancestor and genes that have been retained though out generations. We have tested and found the best animals to test on and do so ethically through a progression starting with tissue cultures, then moving to mice, monkeys, and then chimpanzees before humans and more often than not these so-called tests have proved wrong and many drugs have been taken off the market. That's what animal testing is for. To find these problems before they're used on humans. Scientists do everything they possibly can to perform their research and keep the animals pain-free and happy. Its part of the oath of ethics scientists follow and all testing procedures must be approved by a board of scientists. A lot of scientists have difficulty working with animals like chimpanzees because they get attached to the animals because they don't just stick them in a cage. They interact and play with them and spoil them with treats and toys. They also use as few animals as possible. A new hepatitis C treatment has recently progressed close to the human stage using only four chimpanzees. The new treatment looks good not only for curing hep C, but also as a possible way to lower bad cholesterol by 25-54%!

• Animal testing has been misused greatly or the ASPCA (U.S.) and SPCA (Canada) would have not gotten involved in over-seeing the misuse of animals and the cry from Cruelty To Animals Rights would not have been involved. Many labs in the past have literally been shut-down pending the mistreatment of animals; find animals near death; sores on their body; eyelids closed shut, etc. It has been on the news; in the papers and thus, the ASPCA and SPCA are involved very heavily to curtail this treatment so it is a less common practice today. Many products such as cosmetics will say 'not tested on animals.'

Answer 2

Animal studies alone are insufficient to prove that the product is both safe and effective in humans.

Some drugs are difficult to test in animals... for example, AIDS drugs, since HIV is human-specific. However, some indications can be had by testing it against related viruses like SIV.