View Poll Results: Animals in medicine - what do you think?

Voters
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  • Absolutely necessary and right

    18 72.00%
  • Not necessary but right, nevertheless

    1 4.00%
  • Necessary but wrong

    4 16.00%
  • Not necessary and wrong

    2 8.00%
  • Animal research is part of my job

    4 16.00%
  • I am an activist against animal research

    2 8.00%
  • I’m hypocritical – I don’t approve but still use drugs made possible by animal research

    2 8.00%
  • On the fence

    2 8.00%
Multiple Choice Poll.
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Thread: Animals for medicine?

  1. #21
    Papa Smurf
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ghost
    Personally I'm still against it. For me it comes down to choice. A human being can chose to be a subject of medical testing. An animal can't - perhaps more importantly an animal can't chose not to be a subject of animal testing.
    An animal is unlikely to make an informed choice, being as sentient as your average 'weakest link' contestant. We still eat animals and that seems to be more acceptable than experimentation - I wonder if thats because 'torture' , or what is seen as torture, is much more abhorent that simple execution ? Anyway, what about stupid humans? can they 'choose' to be experimented on? is that moral?

  2. #22
    Papa Smurf
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    and..er..apologies for messing up tessa's poll but my philisophy of life is distinctly jungian and i can justify ticking all the boxes when a poll gives me that option

  3. #23
    Donna
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadful Scathe
    Anyway, what about stupid humans? can they 'choose' to be experimented on? is that moral?
    What about carrying these experiments out on smurfs?

  4. #24
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    smurfs are unique, so any results would only be applicable to other smurfs

  5. #25
    Ceroc N.I. Franchise Owner drathzel's Avatar
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadful Scathe
    smurfs are unique, so any results would only be applicable to other smurfs
    Well folks are we willing to sacrifice one for the masses of smurfs out there?

  6. #26
    Registered User Lynn's Avatar
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Wow, a thread that stayed on topic for a whole 20 or so posts!

    Regarding those who claim to be against any animal testing - would they refuse medical treatment if they or their family were ill, if that medical treatment had in the course of its development been tested on animals? (Are there many medical products that have never, at stage, been tested on animals?) They should surely insist on only using treatment that hasn't been, to be consistent?

  7. #27
    Registered User El Salsero Gringo's Avatar
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by Lynn
    Wow, a thread that stayed on topic for a whole 20 or so posts!

    Regarding those who claim to be against any animal testing - would they refuse medical treatment if they or their family were ill, if that medical treatment had in the course of its development been tested on animals? (Are there many medical products that have never, at stage, been tested on animals?) They should surely insist on only using treatment that hasn't been, to be consistent?
    Not at all. If they had a choice about an equally effective drug that hadn't been tested on animals, then to make a silly point they might choose to that over the other. But just because the most effective drug *was* tested on animals there is no moral obligation for the anti-animal testing person to avoid that drug. They might argue that the same drug could have been discovered sooner, and more effectively, without the use of animals. (Of course, I suspect they'd be wrong - but there's no contradiction in the position.)

  8. #28
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by stewart38
    If all the flora and fauna died we as a race would die hence the 'obligation'
    Yup. That'll do me for an explanation.

  9. #29
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by El Salsero Gringo
    Er... we do? And where, exactly, does this obligation spring from? Given your very strong anti-religious feelings, I'd be interested to hear.
    Um - religion, ethics and morals all different things.

    From a utilitarian standpoint, other things being equal and as far as practical, we should follow the course that causes least damage to our world.

  10. #30
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    I think this business about animals choosing whether or not to be experimented on is a red herring.

    The reason why the tests are done on animals is precisely because 'choice' doesn't enter into it, animals not being moral entities with the ability to select between possible outcomes. To bring the 'possibility' of choice into the equation is to beg the question. The issue is, animals being essentially dumb protoplasm (please, no dewy eyed tails about super intelligent collies and dolphins...) is it right to experiment on them?

    If the question is 'Should we experiment on animals if they were like four-legged intelligent moral beings' then we'd be having a science fiction discussion.

  11. #31
    Registered User El Salsero Gringo's Avatar
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by Barry Shnikov
    The issue is, animals being essentially dumb protoplasm (please, no dewy eyed tails about super intelligent collies and dolphins...) is it right to experiment on them?
    Yes but where do you stand on the issue of experimenting on smurfs?

  12. #32
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by El Salsero Gringo
    Yes but where do you stand on the issue of experimenting on smurfs?
    Its wrong, smurfs are people too!

    OK I admit I've not read all the responses since I'm at work, so apologies if I'm repeating anything someone else has already said.

    Morally I'm against it - both smurf-based and animal testing. But logically there are problems with it too. I remember hearing from my school days (oh so long ago) that guinea pigs can't take penicillin (sp?) and it does them actual physical harm. If animal testing were in place when this was being developed, we wouldn't have pencillian in modern medicine, and susequently all the derviative medicines developed from it. Simply because an animal reacts well to it doesn't mean that humans will, or vice versa, so I can't really see the sense.

    OK off the soap box now and back to work

  13. #33
    Registered User David Franklin's Avatar
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by Princess Fi
    I remember hearing from my school days (oh so long ago) that guinea pigs can't take penicillin (sp?) and it does them actual physical harm. If animal testing were in place when this was being developed, we wouldn't have pencillian in modern medicine, and susequently all the derviative medicines developed from it.
    From the RDS website:
    The reaction of the guinea-pig to penicillin was first described in a scientific paper in 1943. High daily doses of very impure penicillin killed 95% of guinea-pigs within 3-4 days. When the purity was increased tenfold, 60% died. We now know that even these preparations were only 60% pure. This it is quite likely, and is actually suggested in the 1943 paper, that the impurities in the early samples of penicillin were responsible for some of the toxicity. The paper also went to great pains to emphasise that the toxicity of penicillin for guinea-pigs did not mean that penicillin was toxic for people:
    “When treated with the same dose of penicillin per kilogram as the given to man guinea pigs did not die and, in fact, failed to show nay signs of toxicity.”
    Quote Originally Posted by Princess Fi
    Simply because an animal reacts well to it doesn't mean that humans will, or vice versa, so I can't really see the sense.
    When it comes down to it, this argument (and a lot of the "scientific" arguments against animal testing) is saying "if it doesn't work perfectly, I can't see the point". (Or, "if I can find a case where it doesn't work, I can't see the point").

    There was/is an analogous situation in the USA where people argued against wearing seatbelts by citing very rare cases where someone was "thrown clear" of a crash which would have likely been fatal if they had remained in the car, even if wearing a seatbelt. And yes, it's true that in those cases, you are worse off if you wear a belt. Seatbelts are not a perfect solution. But the 99% of cases where wearing a seatbelt saves you from death or injury are more significant than the rare exceptions.

    [Of course, a quantitative argument can be made in either case that more harm is done than good, but that's entirely different from the "perfect or worthless" dichotomy many advocates suggest.]

    From what I know of animal research, I'm sure that scientists would be the first to stop using animals if they could see an alternative.

  14. #34
    Registered User El Salsero Gringo's Avatar
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    Quote Originally Posted by Princess Fi
    Simply because an animal reacts well to it doesn't mean that humans will, or vice versa, so I can't really see the sense.
    Because there's so much more to animal experiments than just feeding them a drug and seeing if they die.

    Animals are used to study diseases, and the effects of drugs, in great detail, in ways which would be impossible on humans. Decades, even, before a potential drug therapy is suggested, scientists work to understand how a disease affects different cells in the body, how those effects lead to symptoms, and how different treatments in the future might work.

    To counter your penicillin argument with another, equally silly one: Banting, Best and Macleod in 1922 isolated insulin and discovered it's role in diabetes through experiments on dogs. The lives of diabetics began to be saved only six weeks later, when insulin was administered to a 14 year old boy who was dying of the disease. (Banting and Best were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine in 1923.) Without animal experiements, we might still not understand diabetes and millions of people would die of it each year.

  15. #35
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    Re: Animals for medicine?

    OK fair poitn about the guinea pig studies (I never did pay too much attention to the point being made in school when I was originally told the story) but I'm still not convinced that it is entirely ethically correct to use animals in this fashion.

    Yes testing of sorts will have to be undertaken in order to make advances in medicine, (I'm sure most people out there would not be happy to be taking medicines which they knew had not been tested at all), but I would hope that in the future we would be able to make these advances without using these means (and I do agree with DF that scientists would stop using animal testing if there was another option).

    I'm sure other people will disagree (otherwise we wouldn't have all these responses) - I'm simply voicing my opinion which will undoubtedly be disputed by others.

    But on the plus side, its nice (if bizzare) to see such a serious topic being debated with such committment on the forum...

    ... or maybe I'm such a newbie that I've missed such threads in the past

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