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Should animals be used in scientific research
Should animals be used in scientific research
Controversy of animal testing
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Dear United States Government,
To obliterate the respect of an animal's life is to disregard the lives of thousands of people. Using animals for research has been a heated topic of debated for years now; and approximately 60% of tested animals are being used in product-safety tests, this includes cosmetics and medicines (New England Anti-Vivisection Society). We live in a world full of cruelty, a world full of hate, but also... a world full of love; so why do we take our hatred out on the innocent lives of billions of animals? More damage is done to the earth by a human being than by 100,000 rodents. People view animals as either a companion, or as a means of advancing our world medically; but that doesn’t change the fact that animals are
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It is known that both human and animal have what is known as sensory tissue that acts as an alarm system for your body to warn you that damage could be caused; this means that we both feel pain. The International Association for the Study of Pain describes pain in animals as “an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage” (The International Association for the Study of Pain). Actually, animals feel pain and react the same way as humans do when inflicted with pain, including screaming and the tightening of muscles. As stated before, when animals are subject to laboratory research or toxicity testing they face immense pain and sometimes death. One famous toxicity test is the Draize test (usually performed on rabbits) this test is infamous for the extreme pain and suffering forced upon the animals. During this test animals are restrained and the product being tested is placed in the eyes, and that animal is then monitored to see any eye damage and to ascertain the effect it would have on a human. End results usually include intense pain and blindness, this test has been chastised as a waste of time and of animal. Although the use of this test has diminished over the past few years it has not been completely eradicated. Animals are still being put through tests that apply immense pain and cause unnecessary deaths while being unable to help with human-safe products. According to Thomas Hartung, a professor of evidence-based toxicology at John Hopkins University, using rats for toxicity, for example, must not be accepted as reliable since humans are nowhere close to being 70-kilogram rats (Hartung). We may be biologically related, but size and structure and health conditions are completely different between human and animal. In fact, a recent study
Many people believe that animal cruelty is an acceptable consequence if done for scientific purposes or to sustain human economy. Just imagine yourself being a monkey, for a shampoo testing organization, being forced to take chemicals down your throat to see its effect, and if you didn’t die during this process, you would’ve been killed and dissected anyway to see what organs have been affected. All this needs to be done for what purpose? To make sure that someone could have the really needed necessity of having another great, lovely new shampoo that smells exactly like all the others in the market, just wonderful.
Have you ever seen a stray animal on the side of the road and thought nothing of it? It is actions like that and others that continue to make this planet a cruel place for domestic animals to live. Many domestic animals are not created to destroy or harm anyone or anything. They are meant to be surrounded by loving caring humans who want to have a mutually beneficial relationship better them. Sadly, these animals are taken into shelters or pounds and if not claimed or adopted they are euthanized or become test subjects. According to PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, “each year, more than 100 million animals are killed in U.S. laboratories for biology lessons, medical training, curiosity-driven experimentation, and chemical,
...Because people see animal testing procedures as unethical and immoral, it’s important for them to consider what their health would be like without the process—potentially afflicted with incurable illnesses. Continuing the animal experimenting process can only prove beneficial in promoting fewer ailments and cures to existing and future diseases.
The roots of animal experimentation began in the early 1600s when the world expressed in interests on the functions of animals and their uses in human life. However, it wasn’t until the incident regarding the drug thalidomide in 1960 did the government make it a requirement for drugs be tested on animals. During the incident, millions of women took the medication believing that it would be a source of relieve from morning sickness, not knowing however that it would cause irrevocable effects on their unborn children (Watson 4). Although the ruling seemed to provide a sigh of relief to some, the very idea of placing animals in strange uncomfortable environments and experiencing pain and euthanasia angered many. According to the American Anti-Vivisection Society, commonly known as AAVS, It is wrong to treat animals as objects for the purpose of scientific research, and to cause them pain and suffering (“Animal Research Is Unethical and Scientifically Unnecessary”). Although the arguments against animal experimentation seem credible, animal testing on medicines and products are necessary in order to insure the safety of human beings.
One word comes to mind when I think of animal testing: cruel. Animal testing has been a subject of debate for many years. While most people think that using animals to test products is a reasonable approach, in reality the outcome does not always show how the products will react on humans, and the animals suffer unnecessarily. The United States needs to ban all animal testing like the European Union did because testing on animals is cruel and animals should not be dying from it.
Hurting an animal is better than hurting a fellow human being right? Well imagine a child being ripped away from his mother in today’s society, for no reason. Would that be considered okay, or kidnapping? Imagine humans being forced to breed, just so their children can be tortured for makeup or a new facial wash. Would that be considered okay, or morally incorrect? People do not see animals as fellow living things, because they do not have the power to say no like a person can. They can’t stand up for themselves, leaving the people of the world to do it for them. Seeing that there are other ways to test out consumer products, why harm defenseless, breathing, loving, beings? With all things considered, animal testing “has no place in science today” (Goodall, 1).
Every year, over 100 million animals are killed for experimentation, biology lessons, medical/military training, and cosmetic, drug, and chemical testing. Animals are tortured all over the world and still lack lawful protection.
PETA states that, since before the 1920’s there has been animal experimentation. Not until President Lyndon Johnson signed the Laboratory Animal Welfare Act (LAWA) in 1966, animals in the United States had no protection in laboratories, circuses, and zoos over breeding, transportation, housing, feeding, and veterinary care. The LAWA is now called the Animal Welfare Act (AWA). (Williams, and DeMello)
Throughout history, animal testing has played an important role in leading to new discoveries and human benefit. However, what many people forget are the great numbers of animals that have suffered serious harm during the process of animal testing. Animal testing is the use of animals in biological, medical, and psychological studies. The development and enhancement of medical research has been based on the testing of animals. There are many questions being asked if animal research is good or not or if the benefit for us is way greater the abuse of animals. Doing tests on animals can help find ways to cure diseases, but testing on them is wrong. Although we want to find cures for diseases to help many people, testing on animals not only brutally hurts them but it also denies the animals the rights they have.
One of the many painful tests administered to animals in laboratories is the Draize Test. This experiment, introduced forty-five years ago by FDA toxicologist John H. Draize, "is used to measure the harmfulness of chemicals found in household products and cosmetics by observing the damage they cause to the eyes and skin of animals" (Products, 1, 97). The brutal results of these series of tests (usually on rabbits) leave animals with mutilated, blind, or ulcerated eyes. At the end of these immoral tests, the animals are all killed to study their internal anatomy. Products, 97.
(Sub-Point # 1) According to The Humane Society International, animal testing is the process of using living animals for research purposes. Much of this research is done for common human use such as medicine, cosmetics, shampoos, cleaning products,pesticides, contact lenses, and diapers. Most of these research facilities will tell you that the pain the animals feel during testing is considered “mild”, but still have the potential to cause pain, suffering, and even death for the animals. Common procedures include forced exposures to chemicals which is done by injections. Animals are also inflicted pain with wounds so that either their healing or stress level can be studied. At the end animals are killed or are used in other experimentations. The number of animals that have been tested on should be reported, but 90% of the animals used in testing here in the United States are not represented on government statistics (Rowan,
There are those who will still fight for animal rights, but one might wonder if this issue isn't just an excuse for some twisted person to do bodily harm to another. "Brian Cass...was left with a three-inch head wound after the attack" (Cass). Here is a quote from the PETA celebrity spokesman, Bill Maher "To those people who say; My father is alive because of animal experimentation,' I say 'Yeah, well good for you. This dog died so your father could live. "Sorry , but I am just not behind that kind of trade off." What kind of attitude is that? Perhaps the people who feel this way should have no more rights than an animal. That is cold, that a person could say that. Human life is the most valuable to God or he wouldn't have given us the means to protect and preserve our rights.
Animal testing is an act of barbarism, the fact that animals are being bred to be a victim of crude experiments and then euthanized is cruel. An Eye Irritancy Test is a test in which albino rabbits have a substance entered into their eyes that are held open with clips for seven to eighteen days. The rabbits are confined in stocks with only their heads protruding while experimenters record the damage of the eye tissue which can vary to being swollen eyelids, inflamed irises, ulceration, bleeding, massive deterioration, and blindness. Many rabbits break their necks as they struggle to escape from the pain. Another savage test is an Acute Toxicity Test, also known as lethal doses, or poisoning tests. This test determines the amount of a substance that will kill a percentage of a group of test animals. Substances are forced into the animal’s body by tubes to the stomach, cuts to the throat, introduced to the eyes, mixed into food or inhaled through a gas mask. Reactions to this test can include convulsions, heavy breathing, diarrhea, constipation, emaciation, contortion, skin eruptions, and bleeding. The testing period continues until at least half of the animals die, approximately two to four weeks. Keep in mind, anesthesia is absent during these procedures.
To predict the effect it will have on humans, many different tests are performed on animals. A test created by John Draize, called the Draize eye test, is tested for eye irritancy. This test looks for the damage that chemicals may cause to the eyes. During the test, a substance is placed in a rabbit’s eye and the rabbit is observed in intervals. There are many consequences such as bleeding, ulcers, and blindness for up to three weeks and may even result in the death of the animal (aavs). Of the several experiments performed on animals for research purposes, they all appear to affect the animal
In addition, people consider that animals are suffering in the experiments. But according to the author Harish (2011), 44% of animals were used in experiments, which involve pain. What’s more, most animals are getting pain relief drugs in the experiments. That can make animals not feel pain. So, the medical animal testing should be done.