• Question: How is it justified to test on animals that COULD lead to a cure for humans, And even after it passes animal testing how do you justify testing it on humans because you dont know what the outcome will be untill you actually test it

    Asked by must520yank on 28 Jan 2025.
    • Photo: Jamie Honeychurch

      Jamie Honeychurch answered on 28 Jan 2025:

      This is a very emotive subject and one that people have very different opinions about. Currently regulations for new drugs going in to humans are required to have some degree of safety/efficacy testing in animals first, This is very carefully regulated and there are a lot of ethical and legal frameworks in place to make sure this is kept to a minimum and that animal welfare is paramount. In humans, there are early phase clinical trials to test safety before being rolled out to efficacy studies. All trials are carefully explained to participants who do so voluntarily. This is also mandatory. Ultimately this is deemed necessary and a justifiable degree of “cost” compared to the potential “benefit” and there would be no new treatments developed without these steps.

Comments

  • Photo: melissau

    melissau commented on :

    This is a very emotive subject and each of us has our own opinion on the extent to which it is ‘ok’ to test medicines on animals. As Jamie has said, it is a legal requirement for potential new drugs to be tested in animals first before being tested in humans. The same is true for drugs which are designed for animals, they also have to be tested on animals before they can be deemed ‘safe’ for use by vets, vet nurses and animal owners. In the past, the regulations were less strict than they are now and there are some well documented situations where drugs were made available for treating people and these drugs caused life changing damage to the patients who received them (one of the most infamous ones was a drug called thalidomide which was prescribed for pregnant women who were experiencing morning sickness, it appeared to reduce their morning sickness but their babies were born with severe physical lifelong deformities. Companies which are using animals to undertake these legally required tests are required to have a Named Veterinary Surgeon working within their testing facilities, this person is responsible for ensuring the welfare of the animals and for assessing the extent of harm which tests involve using principles called the 3Rs – reduce, re-use, replace, which aim to minimise the need for animal testing as far as possible.