Seems like you have two main choices and many smaller choices to make depending on which door you walk through. You can stay there in your current position. Then make the choice to either make the best of the situation, i.e. treat the animals well as someone else who has that experience did, or try to make changes from inside the industry. Seems to me less animals can be used in favor of computer models, stem cell research, etc. If you stay there but move to a job further away from the animal testing (in my opinion) you are still supporting it so you may as well stay where you are and treat the animals the best you can until their death. Unless the other position gives you policy/decision making ability that will benefit the situation for the animals.

Or you can leave and investigate other professions. You seem to have an interest in alternative medicine. Please continue your research into it before deciding. You mention it cannot cure genetic diseases. Actually some healers are now doing that. Please read the book The Reconnection by Eric Pearl readily availible, Amazon, etc. Eric was a successful LA chiropractor when healing energy started coming to him and he takes part in radical healings. He now travels the world giving lectures and teaching this to others. Read the book and see if you feel drawn to check it out more. If not this is not for you. I am an energy healer (Reiki, Reconnection, etc). I am just starting out in my new "career", having just left my office job for it. I am constantly amazed at the results and the energy continues to grow as I use it. I expect someday to see these kind of amazing dna level results healing people. Another famous healer with a somewhat different approach to energy healing is Adam (no last name used) who has been famous for this since he was 16. Another one using a different method but working on genetic/dna level is Vianna Stibal. Isn't it better that we learn to cure the disease rather than treat the symptoms with an onslaught of prescription drugs? Some areas of alternative medicine are doing this now. I see this field as the future.

Only you know what is right for you to do. If you can stay in your current position and effect change on how the animals are treated and eventually the amount of them used that is an admirable thing to do. Or if you leave and follow some other healing path that is great and I wish you sucess. Or you may go into some unrelated field. Just go within yourself for the answers because they are there.

easy to solve this one, my friend.

many researchers in the past experimented on themselves- self-vaccination, taking untested potions, etc. so if you are worried about harming animals, your own body is there for the big test.

this is not an unusual event in the history of science.

Dr Duisberg was challenged to inject himself with the HIV virus to test his hypothesis that HIV does not cause AIDS.

i gave you the solution, it's up to you to carry it out!!

Firstly, I just wanted to thank you for what you do, how you go about doing it and for caring about how you do it. I have a five year old daughter with Retts syndrome. It is a debiltating neurological sydrome that causes loss of hand use and speech; 50 % of girls with the disorder will never walk; 50% will have seizures and severe scoliosis; all have ataxia and a myriad of other problems and complications. My daughter seemed to have dodged a lot of those bullets but did develop seizures nine months ago and is now on an anit-seizure medication.

I myself am a Universalist Unitarian so I know a bit about Buddism and I myself live with the same moral struggles every day. I too realize what animals and this planet sacrifice so that my daughter can have as full of a life as she can have. I know the drain on resources and our overall economy she uses. Every time I thorw away yet another pull-up (diaper) I cringe. I struggle with questions like do I apply for Medicare even though right now we are okay financially? Do I fight harder at public schools to get her the education she and other kids like her derserve? Or do I pull her out and put her in a private school which would save my sanity but have one less parent fighting for our children's rights to be educated?

As my head starts spinning with all these questions I watch my beautiful daughter doing her thing in the best way she can. Her human spirit puts everything in perspective for me because at the end of the day that is what matters most. She is here to teach me, my husband and the world some very valuable lessons. One of which being you can't put a price on anyone's spirit, animal or other wise. The spirit of your lab rats help the spirit of my daughter shine through. One day your spirit will find a better way for my daughter's spirit to shine. Until that day, when we no longer have to sacrifice animals for medical research, you and I will continue to honor those little spirits and thank them for what they contribute to this world. I have come to terms with this the best way I can by honoring all those involved in my life no matter how small. From the immigrant farm workers who help bring food to my table; to the lab rats who help develop medicine for my daughter and of course to the scientist who cares enough to care.

With Peace and Gratitude,

Mom with a Very Special, Special Needs Daughter

I got out of the military a couple years ago even though I was a young high-school drop-out who had to support a wife and two young kids.

It was incredibly hard at the time, and it still is (we didn't qualify for food stamps even though we're well under the poverty line for a family of four...because we're still married) but I could not in good conscience stay in the military at this time. As an enlisted mechanic I was not wealthy by any means even when I was on active duty, but at least I had security, a 3-bedroom house on base, health care, etc. etc. Hell, I was even stationed in Hawaii.

Now, as a married, full-time college student with kids, I don't have shit. We are P-O-O-R.

But I made a choice, based in large part on my perception of my particular place in the world and what I was doing with my life as a aviation mechanic in the US military at this point in history. I'm far from a buddhist or even a pacifist, but I simply could no longer help a network of silver-spoon military-industrial overgrown frat-boys rape my country, both financially and politically. That is what is occurring in America right now, in my not-so-humble opinion (my opinion is most of what I have, so I'm entitled to make it grand and sweeping).

Anyways, I wish had your problems, Mr. Buddhist. Working in a medical lab sounds pretty nice to me. Life is hard. It's not easy to maintain a feeling of moral superiority in a world as full of people as this one. But I guess at least one of us has done it, so here's to me.