Is there an alternative to animal drug testing?

This is something i have only started looking into & a great quote that is quite popular that i've passed is

"Ask the experimenters why they experiment on animals, and the answer is: 'Because the animals are like us.' Ask the experimenters why it is morally OK to experiment on animals, and the answer is: 'Because the animals are not like us.' Animal experimentation rests on a logical contradiction."

To top this off, i've also read that animal experimentation is quite largely opposed by various science fields. Vivisection in particular as training for medical students as the animal is not a human its physiology is different. Business market research also shows people are much more likely to buy products that are sold at reasonable prices that also market organic/fairtrade/animal-cruelty free etc products & there is an increasing demand for them.

A big opposition is obviously that an animal is not a human, not even a primate. There are numerous examples you can google where animal-reasearch showed promising results but when released to the market for humans started showing side-effects that could have not been analysed from animal research. Also that only 1/4 roughly of animal use in experiments has resulted in medical aid & even at that nothing spectacular + the exaggeration that animal experimentation in the past has provided huge benefits for mankind is grossly overexagerrated.

Most sites seek not an abolitionist approach of animal research though that is a long term goal, but better standards placed in & alternatives heavily used where possible. Most of the public is against already cosmetic experiments, there are alternatives but as to the effectiveness & how much they are employed in the industries i cannot say. As i said this is a new topic for me

I understand how you could feel about animal testing. But human testing is immoral and unethical. I know that those animals don't deserve it is the only type of testing available at the moment. Even PETA, has articles on alternative testing WITHOUT torture. It's very hard to do. As for cancer, they are not testing on humans, they do treatments. These treatments may not be 100% but they have saved thousands of people. And how is killing a bear that is trying to disembowel you, evil? It's called Natural Selection and Humans are at the top. If you let bears kill you because you think its cruel to kill them, let me tell you; they don't think you are a ball of cuteness. Bears are instinctive and will kill you without remorse, without sympathy. That's just now called "Survival of the Fittest". Be killed or kill; totally related to wild animals.

**added**

Sure there is another viable alternative to whole body tests, some in which they don't necessarily cover cancer but as for Pakinson's and such they have Stem Cell Research. Now that is the use of REAL humans, although dead fetuses they are gathered from abortions. Did you mean that alternative, because apart from animal there is that and nothing else. In order to advance in medicine so you and I can enjoy being healthy, we must take some low blows. You, yourself have had taken part in animal testing, how do you think they developed the necessary vaccinations you need to attend school? Take my opinion as you want, but some things are thanks to animal testing. I'd pick testing on animals than testing on dead fetus any day. Pretty horrid world we live in today, isn't it?

No, there is no alternative since it is impossible to predict the influences on genes etc. But that doesn't mean that negative results in non-human animals will predict the same in humans, or that an absence of harm in non-humans will mean the chemical is safe in humans. Ironically, the same principle which tells us we must test drugs on non-human animals (since they are so similar to us) is what allows things like GM foods to be available despite showing negative impacts in animal models (since non-humans are so different to humans).

So the vegan principle is to consider non-human animals to be worth no less than humans, and perhaps to embrace death and disease as a natural part of our life which doesn't need to be fought tooth and nail. I think this opinion is logically more sound than the dichotomous example highlighted by the comparison between drug and GM research above, which relies on the deaths and suffering of millions of non-human animals in efforts to help or save a small proportion of humans.

If people want cures for things they can test on themselves. It's not their right to test on animals, animals are not humans to use.

Besides, we are always complaining about overpopulation and people are destroying the earth with global warming etc. so maybe the world is trying to tell us something by coming out with all these illnesses.

Nup