Animal Experimentation Is Unnecessary and Cruel Essay

Many scientists claim that without animal testing, medical breakthroughs and research would not have progressed to where it is today. Some people claim that animals do not have rights and mankind naturally has dominion over them, making it acceptable to use them for scientific experimentation. This is simply not true. Animals can feel pain. They can suffer. One critic of animal testing maintains that pain is an intrinsic evil, and any act that causes pain in any other creature is morally wrong (Andre). A scientist should not be allowed to perform any experiment on an animal that they would not perform on a fellow human being. Animal testing is not only inhumane, it is bad science, and in light of other alternatives, it should have been halted decades ago. Millions of people still labor under the delusion that animal experimentation is the only way to test new medications, cosmetics, and household chemicals for human use. The media, experimenters, universities, and lobbying groups have propagated this misconception, arguing for the role animal testing has played in past medical advances and exaggerating the potential for it to lead to new cures (“Animal Testing”).

Animal experimentation has been a commonly debated topic for many years; is it science or is it cruelty? Everyone will and can have their own opinions on this topic. Animal testing has contributed to many advances in our medicine, but what about the experiments that don’t work? Could they have been avoided if there had been an alternative to testing animals? Although animal testing may seem ideal, many people do not know what happens behind the closed laboratory doors. Animal testing is inhumane, non-comparable to humans, and extremely costly to American citizens.

The issue of animal experimentation has been hotly debated in regards to many aspects of the problem, such as the rights of the animals and the beneficial results that come from animal experimentation. In the year of 1989, the United States Supreme Court ruled the first victory for pro-animal welfare in the Silver Spring Monkey case when seventeen monkeys had been held captive under inadequate living conditions, and were subject to experimentation that was deemed animal abuse (peta.org). For several decades, animal experimentation has been a controversial issue in the medical world and has made little progress to either side of the spectrum. Although animal testing has developed cures and treatments for several different illnesses that once wreaked havoc across nations worldwide, the animals involved in these tests to produce the medicines may not have been treated humanely. These concerns revolve around the animals environment in the lab, how often they are fed and given water, whether they are enduring any form of physical pain, and if the animal is suffering any serious psychological effects from experimentation (peta.org). Many scientist differ, however, by claiming that animal lives in the laboratory are much healthier and humane than they used to be in the past. These statements are backed by laws that have been made to create standard health

This horrendous process is not only cruel but inhumane. Defenseless animals are seized from their natural habitats and confined to barren cages; socially isolated, and psychologically traumatized. Ask yourself this, is murder moral? Is torture? No! Murder and torture are criminal offenses. Despite this, each year, over 100 million animals including frogs, cats, dogs, mice, rabbits, rats, guinea pigs, fish, monkeys, and birds to name a few, are abused and killed in United States laboratories. For what? Medical training, biology lessons, curiosity-driven experiment, and chemical, food, drug, and cosmetics testing. In the moments before their deaths, these helpless animals are forced to inhale toxic fumes, others are immobilized for hours, some have holes drilled into their skulls or their spinal cords crushed, and others have their skin burned off. If these atrocious acts were performed outside the laboratory, they would be considered a felony, yet vivisectors inflict torture on animals every day without any legal questioning. Call it medical research and you can get away with murder. Animal testing is animal killing, therefore, it should be illegal. Some may argue that animals are not humans, so we have no reason to care about them. You say animals are not humans, yet still, they are used to test human products. Animals do not use shampoo and Windex, so why should they be involved in the

Every year, thousands of animals are forced to undergo multiple experiments and procedures in laboratories for the sake of testing new products or for scientific purposes. Some issues that are in support of testing on lab animals include its contribution to many life-saving cures and treatments, allows to test on a living body system, are appropriate research subjects due to their similarity to human subjects, animals do not have human rights, allows for human products to be tested for safety, religious beliefs that entitle humans to have dominion over all animals, and this method of testing is a small price to pay for advancing medical progress. According to a study done by the California Biomedical Research Association, “…nearly every medical breakthrough in the last 100 years has resulted directly from research using animals. We have made significant progress against diseases such as polio, smallpox, cancer, heart diseases, and diabetes among many, thanks to animals.” Allowing scientists to do their lab research on animals enables them to explore new ways to cure diseases or develop safer products for humans to use. Some values that are in support of animal testing include safety, quality of life, education, and health.

An innocent baby animal is ripped from its mothers arms and dragged by its neck after being locked up in a cold, lonely cellar on its way to the experimentation room where scientists will stick a variety of needles filled with possibly deadly medicine into its delicate skin. In a laboratory a ways down the street is another baby animal being tranquilized with a numbing gun in order for the animals to be tested with no pain gently lifted from its cage filled with toys. It is then brought into a room of highly trained scientists where they will experiment on the animal in no way harming it. Animals experimentation is often defined as using animals to test the safety of products made for cures, treatments, or everyday use through developmental projects (Dictionary.Com). It is a way for scientists to receive data for human beings that may be hurtful or helpful but either way must be found through the use of animals. Millions of animals are used in experiments every single year and has been a practice all the way back to 500 B.C. There is believed to be no other alternative way to receive such spot on results, however, there is a problem that seems to rise across our nation which is whether animals experimentation and testing should be allowed or rejected in the scientific laboratories (ProCon.org). As scientist continually use animals in their medical research, a major debate about the pros and cons of the unsolved issue is looked to

Animal experimentation is cruel and needs to be banned. It is another form of animal abuse. The animals are locked in cold, tiny cages in laboratories waiting in fear of what might happen next. The animals are being treated cruelly and being injected with substances that the scientists do not know if it will harm the animals. “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 what the next terrifying and painful procedure that will be performed on them (PETA).

Tests on animals have been around since the 3rd century since the Greeks dissected the bodies of animals to further understand how humans work. Fast forward in time and into the present where a striking number of animals are used for these purposes. In fact, the California Biomedical Association states that basically every medical theory has been accumulated through the experimentation on animals (“Animal Testing”). Animals are used in research when there is a need to find out what happens in the whole, living body, which is far more complex than the sum of its parts. It is difficult, and in most cases, simply not yet possible, to replace the use of living animals in research with alternative methods. Also, Frankie Trull, a science advocate, has explained, “If you’ve even taken antibiotics, had a vaccine, had chemotherapy, an MRI, a blood transfusion, dialysis, an organ transplant then you

I have always had a great admiration for animals. Being an animal owner of two dogs, I believe that they are a friend of the human and both benefit from each other in the sense of company and joy. They are also great contributors to the balance of the eco system. These are some of the various reasons why I chose this topic. In this research paper I will inform you, the reader of the horrible experiences that innocent animals have to endure due to the fact that supporters believe that animal experimenting is a humane method of bettering our lives.

Imagine not being able to verbalize and unwillingly abducted to a lab to be poked, prodded, tortured, and in some cases murdered. 95% of all animals used in testing are not protected under the Animal Welfare Act, which means that they are exposed to torment and unfair treatment. In most cases the experiments are inhumane, but what does that word mean to society? A previous definition simply states “not human”. However, today the word represents “without compassion for misery and suffering”. Animals suffer from pain the same way humans do, so why should they undergo this kind of treatment? Animal testing is cruel and should be eliminated as a means of research due to the fact that it often ends in killing helpless animals.

Each year there are more than 100 million animals used for experimentation in the United States (Experiments on Animals: Overview). These animals are subjected to appalling conditions during the research period. They are locked up in cramped quarters, denied basic rights, and forced into agonizing experimentation; often times with little prevail, for the benefit of humans. Animal experimentation should be stopped because not only is it morally wrong, but also the results are typically inaccurate and it could be replaced by alternative methods.

A contingent of those against the dog labs at the university protested last month, waving signs that read, "Kill? Heal? What's It Gonna Be?" and "The U Kills Dogs."  A fairly recent article in the Washington Post ("A Terminal Learning Environment"; Nov.  5, 2000) manages to move beyond the emotion and sloganeering used by these protesters to some of the real arguments of those in opposition; that the dog labs are "cruel, unnecessary and a waste of money" and that they "should be eliminated."1   However, the arguments used by the Washington Post (and ultimately, those in opposition) are insufficient to justify the termination of the dog labs at university.  The claim that the dog labs are cruel to the animals is unsubstantiated and

People who disapprove of use of animals as research models frequently appeal to cases when the results of animal testing turned out to be unreliable. It cannot be denied that sometimes treatments approved after animal experimentation are ineffective or even harmful for people. However, it is impossible to ban animal testing only because of these instances, since such errors occur rarely as compared with the number of lifesaving medications that appear as a result of animal research. The examples given below will help to understand the significance of vivisection on animals. There is a long list of illnesses which can be cured today due to animal experimentation. For example, diabetes, appendicitis, diphtheria are successfully treated nowadays as a result of experiments involving animals (Loeb et al. 2716). Antibiotics, which treat bacterial infections, drugs to reduce depression and treat cancer, insulin, open-heart surgery, and medications, which reduce cholesterol in blood, have evolved from animal experimentation (Watson 30).

Imagine being a tiny harmless creature strapped down to a cold metal table in a lab, with no room to move, and multiple experiments, which are harmful to you, being tested on your body. Animals such as; mice, rats, cats, guinea pigs, and many others are suffering through this reality. In today’s society, animal testing, for scientific purposes, has become considered a normal occurrence; however, animals can not accurately represent a real comparison to humans, there are new methods that can replace animals, and scientists understand the toll it takes on animals, so it is considered animal abuse.

Using animals for medical experimentation, product testing, and education is a controversial subject that often leads to a large argument. While the problems can go into detail, the suffering involved in animal experimentation is