Two important considerations to strongly favor animal welfare
Saving a human life is likely net negative due to increased meat consumption and animal suffering. According to a survey, most people believe the welfare of a farmed chicken is negative and equal in size to the positive welfare of a human. Also most people believe the welfare of birds count almost as much as the welfare of humans (they give animal welfare relative to human welfare an 8 on a scale from 0 to 10). But there are more farmed chickens than humans on earth (3 chickens per human), so total welfare is negative. See also this post: net global welfare is negative and declining. This also means that saving a human (meat eater) most likely negatively contributes to global welfare, as it increases meat consumption and hence farmed animal suffering. This is a strong version of the meat eater problem (strong in the sense that saving humans not only increases animal suffering, but increases it so much that total welfare decreases).
Saving a vegetarian human life is likely less cost effective than avoiding farmed animal suffering. There are extremely cost-effective animal welfare interventions. For example development of alternative protein such as cultivated meat saves the suffering of +10 farmed animals per dollar. An average human eats 10 farmed animals per year. So $100 donation to cultivated meat R&D saves the suffering of 1000 farmed animals, which equals the amount of farmed animal suffering caused by 100 years of meat consumption by a human. In size (absolute value), the suffering of 1000 farmed animals is more than a lifetime of human happiness (roughly 3 times as much). In other words: avoiding the suffering of 1000 farmed animals is better than saving a child’s life such that the child lives 100 happy years. According to GiveWell’s estimate, saving a child’s life costs +1000$. Saving 100 healthy human life years easily costs +10.000$. So avoiding farmed animal suffering is +100 times as cost effective as saving a child’s life (assuming the child is vegetarian or vegan).
Two important considerations to strongly favor animal welfare
Saving a human life is likely net negative due to increased meat consumption and animal suffering. According to a survey, most people believe the welfare of a farmed chicken is negative and equal in size to the positive welfare of a human. Also most people believe the welfare of birds count almost as much as the welfare of humans (they give animal welfare relative to human welfare an 8 on a scale from 0 to 10). But there are more farmed chickens than humans on earth (3 chickens per human), so total welfare is negative. See also this post: net global welfare is negative and declining. This also means that saving a human (meat eater) most likely negatively contributes to global welfare, as it increases meat consumption and hence farmed animal suffering. This is a strong version of the meat eater problem (strong in the sense that saving humans not only increases animal suffering, but increases it so much that total welfare decreases).
Saving a vegetarian human life is likely less cost effective than avoiding farmed animal suffering. There are extremely cost-effective animal welfare interventions. For example development of alternative protein such as cultivated meat saves the suffering of +10 farmed animals per dollar. An average human eats 10 farmed animals per year. So $100 donation to cultivated meat R&D saves the suffering of 1000 farmed animals, which equals the amount of farmed animal suffering caused by 100 years of meat consumption by a human. In size (absolute value), the suffering of 1000 farmed animals is more than a lifetime of human happiness (roughly 3 times as much). In other words: avoiding the suffering of 1000 farmed animals is better than saving a child’s life such that the child lives 100 happy years. According to GiveWell’s estimate, saving a child’s life costs +1000$. Saving 100 healthy human life years easily costs +10.000$. So avoiding farmed animal suffering is +100 times as cost effective as saving a child’s life (assuming the child is vegetarian or vegan).