To me animal testing is a horrific yet necessary practice. Obviously none of us have the intention of harming animals, however unless we are wearing grass skirts and eating tree bark it is inevitable. Animal testing is the reason that most of us survived infancy. Without animal testing many of us would be dead due to diseases like polio and chicken pox or chronic illnesses like asthma. Animal testing is in no way pleasant, but we cannot assume that researches enjoy the harming of the lab animals. In order to determine the “morality” of an issue, we must look at both sides.

It is very clear that animal testing can be horrific. The article we were given did a wonderful job of displaying the horror-movie like experiments that occur in a lab. Poor innocent bunnies having their eyes burnt out from YOUR brand name shampoo. Of course, this is exactly what animal rights groups want you to hear about. They want you too feel guilty, and in some cases you should. Most if not all of the products that we buy are commercially manufactured and have been tested, at some level, on animals. So we should buy organic? Set testing labs on fire? That’s the plan.

How is animal testing “good”? Well, in more ways then one. We must first realize that animal testing is NOT a bunch of mad scientists running around a lab chopping off animals’ heads. There are committees like the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee as well as legislature like The Animal Welfare Act that regulate and supervise animal testing. Another point brought up is that animal testing is selfish. I disagree. Research on animals has show how cancer cells grow, lead to cancer treatments, how to grow skin for burn victims, and lead to the development of life saving vaccines.

Scientists in animal testing labs are often left to fight animal activists on why they must conduct animal testing. Scientist are trying to find alternative ways to test drugs and do research, but currently relying on computers is not an option. A quote from the National Association of Biomedical Research sums it up best; “Many processes that occur within the human body remain too complex to be simulated by a computer”. Scientists are however, taking great strides towards alternative testing. Using the “Three R’s-Replacement, Refinement, and Reduction” scientists have found ways to replace some testing with computers, become more skilled at testing causing very little harm to the animals and reducing the amount of animals tested as well as the amount of testing that actually occurs.

No matter what we say about animal testing, we are being hypocritical. We need to recognize its importance and work towards less harmful alternatives.