Wednesday, June 4, 2014

Animal experimentation: why we should NOT do it.

Good evening everyone.  In my last Blog, I explained that my research topic was going to be the importance of animal research in the medical field and as part of my research paper, I was going to address counter points.  The biggest counter point I can think of is the fact that animal experimentation will yield different results than they would on human test subjects.  This is due to the obvious physiological differences between humans and other species of the animal kingdom.  To illustrate this point, lets us consider chimpanzees, who are supposedly over 96% genetically identical to humans.
You would think that due to this genetic similarity, chimpanzees would be the obvious choice test subject.  However, it’s that 4% that makes all the difference in the world according to Dr. Jarrod Bailey, a geneticist and advisor with the New England Anti-Vivisection Society (NEAVS).  Dr. Bailey conducted some research of his own to verify the validity of chimpanzee research in developing HIV and hepatitis B treatments.  I acknowledge that this site and source may be biased in one way or another, but I thought that if I am going to find a sound argument one side of the fence or another, I would find it here.  I would like to use this as a source so that I may put it in conversation with another source that offers contradiction points so that both sides of the issue can be illuminated.  Although I haven’t been able to sift through all his resources just yet, I do believe this to be a good starting point for investigating the claims that experimentation on animals is not justified or relevant. 

~Brent Garlow

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