Speech: Animal Testing
Introduction:
Rows of rabbits wait in cages, their heads tightly clamped in stocks to prevent movement. The lower lids of the rabbits’ eyes are pulled back. Technicians drip nail polish remover, mascara, shampoo, and astringent into their eyes, where the chemicals stay for three to 21 days. The chemicals burn and often blind the animals. Rabbits’ sensitive corneas make excellent subjects for this procedure—called the Draize test—because they cannot cry to wash away the toxic chemicals. They have no tear ducts.
First I will introduce the amounts of animals that are being used in these tests and those tests that they are being used for. Second I will describe what these tests are used to figure out and
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However estimates range from 2 to 20 million of those animals are not being killed to save lives, they are being killed in order to provide vain women with cosmetics.
The tests that these animals are being used in range in cruelty. The two that are the cruelest and are the mostly widely used are the Draize and the LD50 tests. The Draize test, developed in 1944, involves dropping potentially irritating substances into the eyes of rabbits, whose inferior tear ducts do not allow them to cry the substances away. The Food and Drug Administration supports this test. Susan Rick, director of the “compassion program” at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), a Washington, D.C. based animal rights organization.
Points out the fact that “its their test” pointing out that the doctor that developed the test worked for the FDA. Its not surprising then that according to FDA guidelines, new drugs must be determined safe as well as effective. While the FDA has no authority to require animal tests per se, it does require the most accurate tests available. And right now, the FDA believes that means animals. That’s right they have no authority, because there is NO law that requires companies to test their personal care and household products on animals before selling them to consumers. The second, and possibly even crueler than the Draize test is the LD50 test.
LD50 stands for
If you don’t know much about this issue you may assume it’s only a few products that participate in animal testing but in fact it is most of the products on the Walmart and Target shelves that you shop for. These are huge monopolized brands that are using animal testing for no other reason than because it’s the “default method” to test for safety (“About Animal Testing”, n.d.). There are three commonly used methods
Millions of animals are used for product testing and most of them do not come out alive. For proof, neavs.org says that every year in the United States over 25 million animals are used in biomedical experimentation, product and cosmetic testing, and science education. That tells us that millions of animals are used in biomedical experimentation, cosmetic testing, and science education. The animals are treated harshly and there is a 99% chance that they will die. Similarly, animalaid.org states that
All drugs have dangers due to certain chemicals and substances. Because of animal testing, researchers have found another alternative to testing on humans.
The Draize Test is an acute toxicity test widely used by cosmetic companies to test whether their products will cause irritation or other side effects in our eyes. As FDA states “In the eye version of the test, rabbits are placed in restraining stocks so that they cannot wipe their eyes. Their eyelids are pulled apart, and the substance is rubbed onto the eye.”.
The goal of this source is to explain the many uses of animals in testing and give examples of how many corporations are funding this cruelty, stating that this is a necessity to educational purposes. This company is very animal friendly and constantly involved in protecting animals and giving them the rights they deserve therefore, it is a very reliable source.
D. Other deadly tests on animals that began to crop up included the Draize Test and another tested called LD50.
be used as they could interfere with the testing, so animals may have to undergo
Every year, in Europe and in North America tens of millions of animals are used for scientific research, for the testing of drugs and consumer goods as well as for educational purposes including dissection, and surgery practice. The Draize test and the LD50 (lethal dose 50 percent) in particular have been criticized for their animal cruelty and have gained increasing resistance on the part of the animal liberationists and the general public. The Draize test, which involves testing the acute acidity of cosmetics and household products on rabbits’ eyes, and the LD50, in which the toxicity of a substance by determining the dose required to kill fifty percent of the test group within fourteen days, however, are merely two example of the cruelty experienced by animals in biomedical research laboratories.
FDA needs to test on animals.My First reason to support my claim is so it is safe for humans to useFDA.gov use animals to test “vaccines, drugs, and other biologics, and medical devices mainly to determine the safety for humans”(FDA.gov).One reason the FDA needs to see how the vaccines, drugs, and other biologics, and medical devices react
Test animals are subjected to intense pain and suffering like burn, scrape and infection. A perfectly fine rabbit is shaved and chemicals are rubbed onto its bare skin or eye irritation tests is performed by dripping chemicals into its eyes without any pain relief. Repeated oral force-feeding studies are conducted to look for signs of general illness or health hazards like cancer or birth defects. Sometimes these animals are also forced to swallow massive amounts of chemical to determine the maximum dose that can cause death. The saddest part of this is these tests can take weeks or even months to come up with a result and these poor animals are tortured every day to get to that result. At the end of the test, most of the animals are killed either by neck-breaking or decapitation and in some cases if they can be reused for other experiments, they are abused
The barbaric practice of animal testing has been happening since the 19th century, and cosmetics testing on animals has been around since the mid 1900’s, when a woman was injured by using mascara (Murnaghan, "Animal Testing Timeline"). The woman received burns on her eyes, and ultimately was blinded by her makeup. This incidence caused the Food and Drug Administration to pass the 1938 Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act, which introduced testing cosmetics on animals to prevent injuries similar to this from happening (Murnaghan, "Animal Testing Timeline").
I have a serious condition that can only be studied with the help of animal testing and research. This is a problem for me because I absolutely adore animals of all shapes and sizes. My condition is that I have very sensitive eyes and this requires scientists to perform the Draize Eye test on rabbits to test which products meant for eyes are ok for me. The Draize eye test is where scientists put cosmetics, soaps, and chemicals into rabbits eyes and observe them for three weeks. Afterward the rabbits are killed. Usually the rabbits are held in full body restraints so these chemicals can be dripped into their
Animal testing causes unimaginable suffering. Many animals used in experiments are force feeding and go through a long physical pain like the infliction of burn and other wounds to study the study the healing process. The cosmetics companies use the Draize eye test, that help evaluate irritation caused by shampoos and other products. Rabbits are more commonly use for this test and their eyelids are held open by clips for many days so they do not blink away the product being
In this test the chemical being tested if force fed to rats or mice in small amounts until the dosage is in excess. This is continued until at least 50% of the test subjects die. Although the test rodent may not die right away, it may experience seizures and internal damage. This test is considered to be the most cruel of the tests and can only determine how much of a chemical substance is needed to kill a small animal not a human being.
Rabbits are the chosen test subject because they have very poor tear ducts so they cannot wash the substance away. Next is the skin irritancy test which involves shaving the fur off animals and applying the test substance to their skin. The skin is observed for signs of irritation. The third test is toxicity tests. In this test, substances are fed to the animal, and they are observed for signs of poisoning. The test may last several days causing the animals to tolerate extreme suffering. The animals that actually survive the test are killed at the end for autopsy.