The ethics of animal research: a survey of pediatric health care workers
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RESEARCH
Open Access
The ethics of animal research: a survey of pediatric health care workers Ari R Joffe1,2,6*, Meredith Bara3, Natalie Anton1 and Nathan Nobis4,5
Abstract Introduction: Pediatric health care workers (HCW) often perform, promote, and advocate use of public funds for animal research (AR). We aim to determine whether HCW consider common arguments (and counterarguments) in support (or not) of AR convincing. Design: After development and validation, an e-mail survey was sent to all pediatricians and pediatric intensive care unit nurses and respiratory therapists (RTs) affiliated with a Canadian University. We presented questions about demographics, support for AR, and common arguments (with their counterarguments) to justify the moral permissibility (or not) of AR. Responses are reported using standard tabulations. Responses of pediatricians and nurses/RTs were compared using Chi-square, with P < .05 considered significant. Results: Response rate was 53/115(46%) (pediatricians), and 73/120(61%) (nurses/RTs). Pediatricians and nurses/RTs are supportive of AR. Most considered ‘benefits arguments’ sufficient to justify AR; however, most acknowledged that counterarguments suggesting alternative research methods may be available, or that it is unclear why the same ‘benefits arguments’ do not apply to using humans in research, significantly weakened ‘benefits arguments’. Almost all were not convinced of the moral permissibility of AR by ‘characteristics of non-human-animals arguments’, including that non-human-animals may not be sentient, or are simply property. Most were not convinced of the moral permissibility of AR by ‘human exceptionalism’ arguments, including that humans have more advanced mental abilities, are of a special ‘kind’, can enter into social contracts, or face a ‘lifeboat situation’. Counterarguments explained much of this, including that not all humans have these more advanced abilities [the argument from species overlap], and that the notion of ‘kind’ is arbitrary [e.g., why are we not of the kind ‘sentient animal’ or ‘subject-of-a-life’]. Pediatrician and nurse/RT responses were similar. Conclusions: Most respondents were not convinced of the moral permissibility of AR when given common arguments and counterarguments from the literature. HCW should seriously consider arguments on both sides of the AR debate. Keywords: Survey, Animals, Animal research, Ethics
Introduction How we justify animal research (AR) is a controversial issue. Nevertheless, this is an important issue in pediatrics for several reasons. Pediatric health care workers (HCW) often perform (and are expected to perform) AR, promote AR directly with trainees and indirectly as role models, and advocate for use of public funds (from granting agencies
* Correspondence: [email protected] 1 Department of Pediatrics, University of Alberta, 8440 112 Street, Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2B7, Canada 2 John Dossetor Health Ethics Center, University of Alberta, 5-16 University Terrace, Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2T4, Canada
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