Is Animal Testing Really Necessary Essay Example

Animal testing has resulted in jaw-dropping discovery after jaw-dropping discovery, many of which led to countless lives being saved. For many decades, testing on animals has brought new life-saving practices to the medical field. Technological advances such as kidney transplants and open-heart/brain surgery were discovered because of animal testing and the public will see that time and time again, ceasing the practice of animal testing would be detrimental to medical advances that could potentially save a life.  

In the work, “Use of Animals in Biomedical Research” by the American Medical Association, they give a very specific example about how testing on dogs helped make medical advancements. “For example, dogs have been invaluable in biomedical research because of the relative size of their organs compared to humans. The first successful kidney transplant was performed on a dog...” (p. 681). Kidney transplants are needed daily, so much so that there are waiting lists to get one. Without testing on animals, there is a chance that this medical advancement might not exist, and countless lives would have been lost without it.   

Also, testing on animals has brought the world the cure for infectious diseases (smallpox, measles, polio) and has prompted the development of techniques like blood transfusions, burn therapy, and open-heart/brain surgery (p. 682). Diseases like measles and polio are what caused life expectancy to be so low in history. For example, the polio vaccine was created in the mid-1900s, during that time, life expectancy was almost ten years shorter than it is now. Testing on animals has dramatically increased the quality (and time) of life, taking it away would negatively impact society considerably. On the same page, the AMA also writes that “virtually every advance in medical science in the 20th century... has been achieved directly or indirectly [using] animals in laboratory experiments,” proving that without animal testing, medical technology and medicine would be nowhere near as advanced.   

Some people, however, claim that it is unethical to experimentally test animals because “alternative methods of experimentation exist for obtaining the same information.” (p. 682).  Scientists have debunked this claim time and time again, and even then, no mention of these “alternative methods” was mentioned anywhere in the article. Scientific testing on animals is a necessity for human development. As humans evolve, so should medical practices, and that is not possible without a literal test monkey.   

Discovery after discovery has proven that the need for animal testing is significant. As a society, the world needs animal testing to save lives, getting rid of it is unethical. Because of the techniques developed by testing on animals, many lives have been saved, and if people continue to push to put an end to it, countless people will suffer.