Using Animals For Research

There has been a conflict between animal rights supporters and scientists about whether it is ok to use animals in experimental research. Although such research is very beneficial in finding a cure for diseases, animal rights supporters do not support this.
I believe that people and animals cannot be seen as equal, and therefore the death of an animal cannot be the same thing as the death of a person. For that reason, causing animals to die for science, for the sake of saving human lives, may be considered ethical to some if it will contribute to the advancement of science and will be to the benefit of humanity in general. Furthermore, animal rights supporters label scientists as “evil” for causing animals to die in medical experiments, while they do not oppose the people, mostly farmers, who kill animals for food.
People and animals may not be the same, but to some degree there are similarities which can at least give scientists an idea about their experiments. From this point of view, scientists are right to use animal models to provide themselves with information about what is happening at a level of detail that could not be achieved in humans. Although there might have been some incidents when animal testing did not prove to be useful and some effects of some drugs observed on animals could not be observed on people, there are also a lot of examples that show that using animals resulted in significant developments and helped to cure some serious illnesses. Besides, if we do not use guinea pigs for research, then we don’t have any chance to see if the scientific research is going to work or not.
All in all, it can be said that using animals for medical research is ethical as long as it contributes to scientific development and helps scientists find ways to improve human health. And this practice is only acceptable on the condition that necessary precautions are taken and animals are treated humanely.
Cihangir Zülfikar