Refusing Animal-tested Treatments

[goodeone]

I hope you will be able to help me with a problem I have regarding my vegan lifestyle. I have been a vegan for 15 yrs in that time I have to the best of my knowledge avoided animal products either in my diet or household usage as well as avoiding fur, wool, and leather in clothes. I do have on area that concerns me the area of medical treatment and prescription drugs, which I generally avoid using preferring natural methods such as aromatherapy oils for minor health problems. This is fine as far as it goes because as yet I do not suffer from any really painful physical complaints that require long-term treatment. I do suffer from social anxiety/depression but have refused medication for the symptoms because they result from vivisection.
However, I am not as young as I was and I am aware that with increasing age I may at some point need treatment for physical ailments. I would of course choose alterative treatments if they were available. However being on benefits I am not in a position to pay for treatment and so I would have to rely on the NHS.This means trusting doctors to have understanding of how important my vegan principles are to me. Then there is the question of an emergency situation occurring. As one of Jehovah’s witnesses I already carry a legal document on me stating my refusal of blood for religious reasons. However were I to be rushed to hospital what is to stop doctors from imposing animal tested drugs on me? My witnesses friends would support me in a stand against blood but none of them are vegans .So I do not think they would fully understand or be aware of the impact on me as a person if I were treated with products resulting from vivisection against my will.
Some vegans I know would opt to take animal treatments if their life were endangered or suffering great pain. I am not saying they should not be able to do so, however I would wish to have my vegan principles respected, and the option to refuse animal tested drugs, if I personally wish to. This being so even if I should die from the injury/sickness I had sustained. So what is the societies view on this? I have a feeling it is an area totally ignored or left to the individual, which is fine except in emergency situations when the individual may be unable to state their view. Or were one meets up with unhelpful medical persons or non animal alternatives are not offered I think at the very least it would be helpful to know what rights a person has and how to get them recognized. I myself would like some sort of legal backing for the refusal of animal tested drugs in the same way that I have it for my refusal of blood. I know there are no easy answers to this but I think it should be consider and support available for those of us who feel strongly opposed to not only the use of animals as food items, but as tools for research, and wish to avoid the usage of such treatments.

[Gliondrach]

Hello, Goodeone. Could you not carry a card with your wishes on it? Even one you typed yourself. You could get it laminated and could carry one round your neck on a chain or cord under your clothes. You could even register your wishes with your GP.

I, personally, don't know what I would do if I needed life-saving drugs. I tend to think that it is better to survive to carry on the fight than to die for a principle. Having said that, there's no iron-clad guarantee that these miracle drugs would help - some of them cause damage to other parts of the body, so that people die from liver failure or heart disease instead of the disease that they originally had. Some of them might just work by the placebo effect, or be strengthened by it.

About your depression. Many people with mild to moderate - and even severe depression on occasion - find that St John's Wort helps. It has been shown to be at least as effective as the usual drugs. It might be costly, though, as a standardised dose is needed. Exercise is also helpful. There is also a book about cognitive therapy - I forget the title - that is highly praised as a gift for people with depression. It is supposed to have helped many people who read it.

[Bowwowmeow]

I haven't given the practical side of this much thought, and I should, because I feel as you do goodeone. I suppose if I were in an accident, and injured badly, and still had animals to be responsible for, I would want to survive, but I am very much opposed not just to the vivisection involved in most drugs, but their basic ineffectiveness in actually curing chronic disease. I know that there are a few truly lifesaving treatments, like insulin injections for diabetics who would otherwise die without them, but the vast majority of drugs developed for use in chronic disease, as opposed to acute but temporary life-threatening conditions, are designed not to end the disease, but to maintain it while minimizing symptoms and maximizing profits.

As far as pain relief, right now I use no drugs to control pain when I experience it. I didn't even take anything but arnica when I broke my foot. But I don't know how I would be able to cope with the pain of being burned in a fire, for instance, or being smashed up in a really bad car crash. I might give in and let them give me something if the pain were really unbearable. But it would have to be a lot of pain. Not that I enjoy pain. But I am pretty stubborn about sticking to my principles. I wouldn't judge someone else for giving in sooner than I would though. Its hard to say what a person would do until they are actually faced with the situation.

[Tails4wagging]

This is a very difficult one. Most treatments used in the hospitals have been tested on animals. Also drugs that are used in emergency rooms have animal products in them. You cannot afford it.

If I have to have any tablets, medicine, I will use it and think most of these products have already been tested on animals, sometimes many years ago and what I do will not help them.

Also how can I make a difference as a vegan in the world to help animals if I am dead due to refusal of drugs/treatrment?.

[Gliondrach]

I read recently that, in the US, there are chemist shops called compounding pharmacies. The pharmacists can make formulas and tablets on the spot. They can use ingredients that don't contain animal parts, such as tablets without milk or animal fillers and binders. They are still tested on animals but they won't contain animal parts.

I don't know if our chemist shops offer this service.

[Tails4wagging]

I read recently that, in the US, there are chemist shops called compounding pharmacies. The pharmacists can make formulas and tablets on the spot. They can use ingredients that don't contain animal parts, such as tablets without milk or animal fillers and binders. They are still tested on animals but they won't contain animal parts.

I don't know if our chemist shops offer this service.


doubt it!!.

[Gliondrach]

As for pain killers, morphine was probably not tested on other animals when it was first introduced. Modern formulations will have been tested to see how they compare, though. But the drug itself was just made from poppies. And opium has been used for many centuries, so they knew what the effects of poppy extracts were.

Cannabis can be used as a pain killer - not that someone would be given that in hospital.