Animal Human Hybrids

In Discovery News Article "10 Ways Science is Using Human Animal Hybrids" Lauren Effron discusses some of the huge breakthroughs in science that are employing the use of animals as a way to potentially grow human organs, blood or stem cells for research or to specifically use as an aid to sick humans.  It is clear that chimeras, animals that have two or more sets of genetically distinct cells together, are no longer myths and legends but realities.  The emergence of human-animal hybrids is alarming as it calls into question many many ethical issues and brings to mind countless science fiction horrors but, although the idea is unfamiliar and scary the rewards are potentially very great.  There are rabbits in Shanghai that might one day be used as tissue growers for transplantation surgery, pigs in Minnesota with human blood running through their veins that might enable scientists to better understand viral infections and HIV, and mice with human-brain stem cells that might lead to a cure for several neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.  With the stakes so high ethicists may be forced to sacrifice notions of human inalienable rights in order to cure the disease.  If these animals have parts of human in them then how do they fit into preconceived notions about autonomy and human rights but at the same time when reports from PETA claim that roughly 290 animals are killed in slaughterhouses in the United States per second how can we not sacrifice the lives a few (slightly more humanoid) rats to cure devastating human diseases?

http://news.discovery.com/tech/human-animal-hybrid-chimera-splice-slide-show.html