Devolder Katrien, Eggel Matthias
Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 1PT, UK.
Institute for Biomedical Ethics and History of Medicine, University of Zurich, 8006 Zurich, Switzerland.
Animals (Basel). 2019 Apr 9;9(4):154. doi: 10.3390/ani9040154.
Every year, around 12 million animals are used for the purpose of scientific research in the European Union alone. The procedures performed on them often cause significant pain and suffering. Despite regulations aimed at reducing this suffering, we can expect millions of research animals to continue to suffer in the near to mid-term future. Given this reality, we propose the use of gene editing to create research animals with a reduced capacity for suffering, in particular, from pain. We argue that our proposal would be in line with moral principles embedded in European regulations regarding animal research, and that it would facilitate compliance with these regulations. We also respond to the strongest argument against our proposal-the 'no pain no gain' argument.
仅在欧盟，每年就有约1200万只动物被用于科学研究目的。对它们实施的实验程序常常会导致巨大的痛苦。尽管有旨在减少这种痛苦的规定，但在近期至中期，我们仍可预期数百万只实验动物会继续遭受痛苦。鉴于这一现实，我们提议利用基因编辑来培育痛苦承受能力降低、尤其是对疼痛的承受能力降低的实验动物。我们认为，我们的提议将符合欧洲动物研究法规中所蕴含的道德原则，并且将有助于遵守这些法规。我们还回应了针对我们提议的最有力论据——“没有痛苦就没有收获”这一论点。
