Contents
- To Understand How Our Bodies Work
- As Models to Study Disease
- To Test Potential Forms of Treatment
- To Test New Drugs for Efficacy and Safety
1. To Understand How Our Bodies Work
Before they can treat disease, scientists and
physicians must know how the healthy body works. Only then are they able to discover
what went wrong and how to correct the problem. Animals are like people in that their
bodies perform many of the same functions; for example, breathing, food consumption,
movement, sight, hearing and reproduction. And many basic cell processes are the same
in all animals.
Because of these similarities, researchers use animal models to study how the normal
body works. In fact, much of the knowledge of the body's anatomy and functions
can be traced to scientific findings from animal research.
Through studies of animals, researchers seek fundamental biological knowledge which
may later be applied toward improvements in the health of humans and animals.
2. As Models to Study Disease
Humans and animals share hundreds of common illnesses. Consequently, animals can act
as models for the study of human illness.
For example, rabbits suffer from atherosclerosis (hardening
of the arteries), as well as diseases such as emphysema, and birth defects such as
spina bifida, hydrocephalus and cleft palate. Dogs suffer from cancer,
diabetes, cataracts, ulcers and bleeding disorders such as haemophilia, so naturally
they are part of this research. Cats suffer from some of the same
visual impairments as humans. From animals, we learn how disease works within the
body, how the immune system responds, who will be afflicted, and much more.
3. To Test Potential Forms of Treatment
Once researchers have some knowledge of a particular disease, treatment plans are
devised and animals are used to test these potential therapies. Data from animal
studies are essential before new therapeutic techniques and surgical procedures can
be tested on human patients. From new drugs to innovative surgery, medical treatments
are tested in animals to ensure our safety.
Diagnostic tools such as the X-ray and implants such as heart pacemakers and artificial
hips are safe and effective only because they were tested first in animals.
4. To Test New Drugs for Efficacy and Safety
Identifying new drugs for treating disease requires animal testing because researchers
must measure the compound's effects--both beneficial and harmful--on the organs
and tissues that comprise the whole organism.
Data documenting efficacy and safety are required before any new drug is approved for
testing in clinical trials on human beings.
Testing on animals also serves to protect consumers and workers from the harmful
effects of chemicals found in our environment--in the air, water and soil; in fields
and factories; in food; and in household and personal products.
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