The Pros And Cons Of Genetically Modified Animals

This allowed for the understanding of emotional bonds in animals allowing generalisations to be made such as when animals are orphaned by their parents, they need to see one of the same species to survive. This is because the young animal with imprint with what they first see and therefore learn the characteristics and behavior needed for survival in the wild. Therefore, if this is the case then genetically modified animals would need to be around wild individuals of the same species to exhibit the same behavioral characteristics. This means that animals could not be simply created in a lab and then be expected to behave in the same way as an individual born in the wild. Following this, it would then be unjustified to create genetically modified

They argue that this allows for greater control and objectivity than there would be is the experiment used humans. Also, humans and animals are highly similar physiologically therefore allowing for generalisations from animal experiments to be made to humans benefitting society. It was Rudolf Jaenisch and Beatrice Mintz in 1974 who produced the first genetically modified animal when investigating the process of tumours by implanting embryos in female mice which had been injected with the Simian virus 40 DNA (Jaenisch & Mintz, 1974). Using these GM animal’s scientists can study disorders in many aspects from neurological, immunological and inflammatory to cancers as well as developing effective treatments such as gene and pharmaceutical therapy (Bedell et al., 1997). GM animals are also used in the xenotransplantation. This is where living cells, tissues or organs are transplanted from a non-human source into a human. There are lots of people on the transplant list hoping for organs to become available and a lot die from such waits though xenotransplantation provides a substitute for human organs and ease the demand for organ supply. However, there is an issue with the choice of animal used. Chimpanzees and baboons are similar to humans however there is higher in the risk of cross-species infection according to XJ Meng et al. (1997). Pigs are a better choice their organs are similar in size to humans, they have large amounts of offspring which quick to reach maturity and are easily in a clean environment. On the other hand, according to XJ Meng (2003) pigs can carry endogenous retrovirus which could be difficult to eradicate. Therefore, due to such complications with xenotransplantation, the public still are too wary of its use to ease the current of shortage of organs successfully. GM animals are also used for agricultural