The People for Ethical Treatment of Animals has vowed to continue to badger the National Institutes of Health until it discontinues funding for research PETA deems cruel to animals.
Very rarely does one find a person who supports the torture or abuse of animals. I am not so sadistic as to do so and certainly hope researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and elsewhere treat their test subjects with utmost respect. These animals provide a first line of protection against potentially harmful medical treatments and supply us with knowledge we could not otherwise attain.
However, PETA has overstepped its bounds, once again, and laid blame where none is due. After allegations were made against a UW-Madison research lab, the United States Department of Agriculture inspected the lab on three separate occasions and came to the conclusion no violations of federal animal rights law had occurred. Still, PETA believes the research should be stopped and the researchers should be punished.
Topics like this require an exploration of our ethics as a society and the hierarchy in which we place lives. While the claims purported by PETA demand justice for their feline friends, it is generally accepted that a human life takes precedence over an animal’s. Even the most passionate animal rights activist must admit their spouse, child or best friend will always come before a pet.
Testing and research involving animals is vital to the preservation of human lives; the kind of research PETA is protesting must exist. Without animal testing, we would not have safe medicines and our quality and length of life would be shortened. Human testing and research is possible, of course, and is frequently conducted. But trying out more serious medications or surgical techniques on people will undoubtedly lead to devastating death counts and perhaps even more horrifying side effects.
To add to these dangers, a proper study requires a control, a group given a placebo instead of the real medication. This means countless individuals must watch their own disease progress. Their families must go through the pain of watching a loved one fall victim to illness and nothing can be done to stop it. Animal testing isn’t pretty and certainly is not ideal, but the alternative is far worse.
Some of PETA’s concerns are legitimate, but oftentimes, as in UW-Madison’s case, they take it too far. Animals do have rights, the United States government enacted the Animal Welfare Act saying just that. But a person always comes before a rat in my book.
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