Jerom, a chimpanzee, was taken from his mother at a young age. Unfortunately, Jerom was part of an experiment and was infected with HIV at the age of two. Jerom spent the duration of his life in the Yerkes National Primate Research Center, which is a federally funded laboratory in Atlanta, Georgia, until he died at the age of 14. He was housed in the Chimpanzee Infectious Disease (CID) building which is isolated from the other housing and research buildings on Yerkes main property. The CID building in which Jerom was kept in was described as a small, windowless box with cement walls and no outdoor access. Reality for these chimpanzees was a grey, dark space with damp floors and walls (Weiss). Because of these living conditions, several of the chimpanzees suffered from depression and were constantly in fear. The wrongful treatment of chimpanzees has been occurring for many years and is beginning to be a major problem. The United States government needs to eliminate medical testing on chimpanzees. It is no longer needed and it ultimately decreases a chimp’s quality of life and often results in death.
Background
Behavioral studies on chimpanzees began in the United States in the 1920s. Robert M. Yerkes was the first psychologist to study the behavior of chimpanzees. When he first started studying these animals, he only concentrated on the behavioral aspects of chimpanzees. He was not interested at this time in using them for medical experiments. Later on in the 1940s was when scientists started to use chimpanzees for medical experiments. Medical studies and experimentations lasted until 1973, when President Richard Nixon signed the Endangered Species Act into law. “The Endangered Species Act made it illegal to import ...
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...t kills more than 66,000 children each year” (Wadman).
Conclusion
The United States government should prohibit biomedical testing on chimpanzees and relocate the animals to sanctuaries such as Chimp Haven, where they will live a relatively normal life and will no longer be experimented on. Chimpanzees have greatly contributed to our understanding of diseases and have helped medical doctors find cures in the past. However, with the advancement of technology the need to experiment on chimpanzees is no longer needed. Chimpanzees have been forced into dangerous, uncomfortable and invasive procedures for many years and have had to deal with the fear and loneliness that the research laboratories provided. These chimpanzees were not meant to be treated and experimented on. The United States has to declare testing on chimps as unconstitutional before it’s too late.
There are contrasts in tool kits used by different groups of chimpanzees, which seem to be a result of the environment in which they live as well as information that is shared by the group. For example, in 1973 it was reported that chimpanzees in Gombe did not use hammer stones, but those of Cape Palmas did. We will explore the tool use of Chimpanzees from the wild, including Gombe, Tai National Forest, and the Congo Basin---and contrast those with Chimpanzees in captivity in locations of Zoo’s both in the United States and abroad.
In primates such as chimpanzees it is imperative to look at their culture to understand their intelligence. Culture in this circumstance means a specific set of behaviors obtained through learning in a population/species. Chimpanzee’s intelligence is quite unique how they interact with their environment and use it to their benefit just like humans. They have the ability to overcome the obstacles of everyday life through learning and the ability to use tools to create a better quality of life. The complexity of their intellect is different from any other animal ever seen. A significant part of chimpanzee intelligence that sets them apart from other primates and puts them closer to humans is the way they exhibit social learning within their culture and interactions within their environment.
An article written by an animal researcher and psychology professor discusses the lack of ethical treatment towards primates in research labs. The author of Second Thoughts of an Animal Researcher, John P. Gluck, justified the unethical treatment of primates by believing that scientific advancements are superior to the harm the primates experienced. One day a student of his presented a dissertation about a female rhesus monkey who unexpectedly passed away. The dissertation caused Gluck to feel that the animals he caused much harm to were more than objects used to create data. Although he tried to continually justify his actions, he eventually felt guilty and decided that the primates deserve to be handled ethically. Throughout the article,
Chimpanzees are part of the non-human primate group. Though we share a common ancestor, evolution has pushed us in different directions. However this common ancestor causes humans to be curious about these creatures. As discussed in Jane Goodall’s video Among the Wild Chimpanzees we were once considered to be human because of our use of tools but once we observed these non-human primates using tools, this perception was changed forever. The question now at hand is if having the chimpanzees that we study in captivity makes a difference between studying wild chimps. These interesting creatures can be found naturally in the rainforests of Africa.
In her essay “A Question of Ethics,” Jane Goodall, a scientist who has studied chimpanzees for years, tries to resolve a heavily debated ethical dilemma: Under what circumstances is it acceptable to cause animal suffering to prevent human suffering? Her answer, however, remains uncertain. Although Goodall challenges scientists to avoid conducting unnecessary tests on animals, she does not explain the criteria by which scientists should determine necessity.
Studying chimpanzees is not an easy task. Subsequently, Jane Goodall made it look as simple as doing everyday activities. When she started the research, the chimpanzees fled from her in fear. It took many months for her to get close to them. With patience and persistence, she searched the forest everyday, deliberately trying not to get too close to them. Everyday she did this for many months. On some days Jane would observe the chimpanzees through binoculars from a peak overlooking the forest, just so she wouldn’t disturb their natural behavior. Gradually over a long period of time the chimpanzees became accustomed to her. At this time, she would be able to move up to them and just sit there and study them. She believed that this was her breakthrough in her research. Jane tells us “I must find a way to watch free, wild animals living their own, undisturbed lives. I wanted to learn things that no one else knew, uncover secrets through patient observation. I wanted to come as close to talking to animals as I could (www.nationalgeographic.com).” To be able to have such patience and persistence is remarkable.
"Animal Testing Is Cruel and Does Not Benefit Medical Research." You Can Save the Animals: 251 Ways to Stop Thoughtless Cruelty. Rocklin, CA: Prima Publishing, 1999. Rpt. in Animal Experimentation. Ed. Cindy Mur. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2004. At Issue. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 7 July
Right now, millions of mice, rats, rabbits, primates, cats, dogs, and other animals are locked inside cold, barren cages in laboratories across the country. They languish in pain, ache with loneliness, and long to roam free and use their minds. Instead, all they can do is sit and wait in fear of the next terrifying and painful procedure that will be performed on them.” (“Animal Testing 101”)
...an ape with a tube in its skull than it is to unite behind a defenseless woman. It is important and even very crucial that such people as disabled people defend animal testing. For example we can return to both the medical and social conditions of what are now thankfully in the past. Doesn’t it make more sense for one to test on chimps before people? In the past, disabled people were used as medical guinea pigs. Call me an animal-hating barbarian, but I would rather use animals than my fellow mental types. (Newsweek 2005)
...d the disease from an infected chimpanzee in the forest. She was sent to a Swiss hospital where she recovered. An autopsy of the Chimpanzee showed effects similar to the Ebola virus.
The majority of animals used for testing are rats and mice. Other animals include hamsters, rabbits, guinea pigs, dogs, cats, nonhuman primates, frogs, and cattle. One case involving monkeys is extremely inhumane, but still continues happening today. A National Institutes of Health laboratory in the United States breeds dozens of monkeys every year to be prone to mental illness. Half of the babies are torn away from their mothers in order to inflict mental trauma on them. The baby monkeys suffer from horrible fear, anxiety, and depression. Their misery lead to hair loss, diarrhea, and even self-mutilation. Along with the already horrifying experiment, the baby monkeys are later caged with their tranquilized mothers. The terrified babies’ frantically attempt to revive their mothers. The monkeys are inflicted with mental traumatization all for an experiment that was of no use. Useless funded experiments continue to happen and many lead to deaths of the
There should be more restrictions on how the animals are treated and the situations in which they can be experimented on. Hundreds of millions of vertebrate animals worldwide undergo animal experimentation each year. The animals being experimented on can become severely injured or sick because of what is tested on them and because of the conditions they are kept in. Over the years, many laws and regulations have been passed to improve the conditions in which the animals have to live. Testing on these animals has created multitudes of scientific breakthroughs. However, animal testing can be very cruel and can lead to the animals being killed or re-used for other experiments after if they do not die during the procedures. Using animals for testing should only be used for necessary experiments that need to be tested to save the lives of many people and should be regulated to not endanger or abuse
John Dewey reported that scientists gave to follow a set of rules known as The Moral Principles of Animal Experimentation. The Moral Principles of Animal Experimentation states that scientific men are under definite obligation to experiment upon animals so far as that the alternative to random and possibly harmful experimentation upon human beings and so far as such experimentation is a means of saving human life and of increasing human vigor and efficiency. It also states that the community at large is under definite obligations to see to it that physicians and scientific men are not needlessly hampered in carrying on the inquires necessary for an adequate performance of their important social office of sustaining human life and vigor (Dewey 344-345). There is also The Animal Welfare Act (AWA). The AWA is the only U.S law that governs the use of animals in the labs.Allows animals to be burned, shocked, poisoned, isolated, starved, forcibly restrained, addicted to drugs, and brain-damaged. Lab physicians are required to provide pain relief for the defined animals used in lab tests and experiments. The AWA does not classify rats, mice, birds, and all cold-blooded animals as “defined” animals. Ninety-five percent of all animals used in tests, between 2010-2014, were the animals that the AWA excluded for not being “defined” animals. This means nearly half of a
“Over 1 million animals are burned, crippled, poisoned, and abused in U.S. labs” according to DoSomething.org. And although these animals may be considered protected under the Animal Welfare Act (AWA) they are still able to be tortured and mistreated in labs. On top of all this, there is absolutely no guarantee that results and data collected from these procedures are accurate. Our anatomic builds are similar in ways but not at all interchangeable. Even though it has saved lives, animal experimentation should be banned because it is not a guarantee that these procedures are done pain free and humans and animals react differently to the medicines and chemicals used.
Such medical experimentations on monkeys created severe health problems and infected wounds, bones sticking, chewed-off fingers and toes as well as even resulted to death. For instance, at the Armed Forces Radiobiology Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, “monkeys were forced and even given electric shocks to run on a treadmill” (Owen 45). Such harsh and unethical human actions and abuse of monkeys for humans’ life betterment are unjustifiable as Regan states "fundamental wrong is the system that allows us to view animals as our resources, here for us--to be eaten, or surgically manipulated, or exploited for sport or money” (Lehman Hugh). Scientists do monkeys’ experiments in lab because of their large supply available and other economic advantages such as low cost. The economic advantages of monkeys enabled scientists to keep them for long period in the lab and use them many times for drug tests. Unavailability of a global comprehensive principle to deal with animal experiments such as medical research on monkeys allowed scientists to put the life of them at risk and the monkeys’ generation at destruction. Also such medical experiments on monkeys increased potential risk of infecting other monkeys and animals the humans’ deceases. Additionally, Many of the researches have done on monkeys do not apply to humans, because they have had adverse effects on humans. The side-effect on humans implies that while humans and