Sophisticated non-animal testing methods exist, so why not spare animals lives., "Many systems using either animal or human cell or organ cultures, as well as plant materials and microorganisms, have been created with emphasis on those which are rapid, inexpensive, and can discriminate between those chemicals whose properties represent a high toxicity risk and those which are relatively innocuous." Highly complex and mathematical and computer models can be used to further define the specific problems a product may cause in human use. .
Animal rights imply that animals deserve certain consideration- consideration of what is in their own best interests regardless of whether they are cute, useful to humans, or an endangered species and regardless of whether any human cares about them at all. Just as a mentally-challenged human has rights even if he or she is not cute or useful or even if everyone dislikes him or her. It means recognizing that animals are not ours to use for food, clothing, entertainment or experimentation.
Animal welfare theories accept that animals have interests but allow these interests to be traded away as long as there are some human benefits that are thought to justify and sacrifice. Animals have right to equal consideration of their interests. For instance, a dog most certainly has an interest in not having pain inflicted on him of her unnecessarily. We therefore are obliged to take that interest into consideration and respect the dog's right not to have pain unnecessarily inflicted upon him or her.
Medical historians have shown that improved nutrition, sanitation, and other behavioral and environmental factors-not anything learned from animal experiments- are responsible for the decline in deaths since 1900. Many of the most important advances in health are attributable to human studies, among them anesthesia; bacteriology; germ theory; the stethoscope; morphine; radium; penicillin; artificial respiration; antiseptics; the CAT, MRI, and PET scans; the discovery of the relationships between cholesterol and heart disease and between smoking and cancer; the development of x-rays; and the isolation of the virus that causes AIDS.
