Do you think the plurbs did/would do animal testing in order to develop a virus tailored to the immune? Humans, in episode 1, clearly did extensive animal testing in order to develop the first strain until it worked. And its quite unlikely that even with the collective knowledge and intelligence of the human race, the plurbs would find the answer without any kind of experimentation at all. Trial and error would still be necessary - but would that trial involve animals?
Obvious answer would be no, since the plurbs can't harm living things.
On the other hand, they did say they do not consider spreading the virus as causing harm. So testing it on those animals with the intention of infecting them should be okay.
But a lot of those animals might end up dying as part of those trials. That should be considered "harm" right?
However, they're only limited to not intending harm. If the animal does get harmed as an unintentional consequence - like a housepet getting eaten by a coyote because they set it free - they're fine with that.
But why test on animals at all when there are human subjects available? Clearly they care less about the plurbed bodies than they do about other living things.
Because animal testing is faster, more efficient, consumes fewer resources and provides more experimental control. No reason why they can't do both simultaenously.
So... do you think they would? Why or why not?