The suffering of test animals is a tiny decimal point compared to the suffering of factory farmed animals, which produce 99% of the animal products humans eat. Literally 50 billion chickens a year in the most inhumane conditions imaginable for their entire lives. Over one billion pigs per year. They die in horrible 9/11-like conditions.
Edit: I used to dismiss all that since I figured animals don't have enough neurons or intelligence or whatever for their pain to matter. A quote from Ozy Brennan[1] (five paragraphs down from this hyperlink, though BB's commentary here is important too) changed my mind. TL;DR: intelligence is almost certainly not relevant to feeling pain, and the same pain pathways that exist in the human brain exist in other animals too.
Edit: I used to dismiss all that since I figured animals don't have enough neurons or intelligence or whatever for their pain to matter. A quote from Ozy Brennan[1] (five paragraphs down from this hyperlink, though BB's commentary here is important too) changed my mind. TL;DR: intelligence is almost certainly not relevant to feeling pain, and the same pain pathways that exist in the human brain exist in other animals too.
[1] https://benthams.substack.com/i/151605056/2-intensely-what-a...