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Rebecca Otto

Rebecca Morean

English 1201

May 19, 2021

Animal Testing: Can it be Stopped?

Animal testing is classified as any sort of scientific experiment or test on a live animal to

see the effects or reactions of the experiment. Often animal testing causes great pain and

suffering to the animals being tested on, leading them to possible deformities, stress, and

constant pain. Often these animals will have an early death for a plethora of reasons, some being

that they are killed after the experiment, they die due to the test performed on them, or their

bodies simply cannot take the stress of living any longer. Many people want these medical tests

to be stopped, but can it be? The simple answer is yes, with new technology people no longer

have to dissect or torture living beings to get the information they need without testing on human

subjects. Animal testing for medicinal purposes can be stopped if humans expand their horizons,

not continuing to do what has been done simply because it "works," and focusing on new

alternatives such as cell cultures and human tissues that produce the same and sometimes an

even more accurate effect without causing harm to our furry friends.

Many people say they understand and know what happens during animal testing. They

believe animals are tested on using new medical technology and drugs to see the effect on them

and scientists use the results of those tests to predict the effect on humans. While this is true,

animal testing goes much deeper than that. The history of animal testing goes all the way back to

Greek writings in 500 B.C. Noted scientific physicians such as Aristotle, Herophilus, and

Erasistratus all performed experiments on animals to understand how living organisms function.
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They were even known to perform dissections on criminals. Aristotle believed that animals

didn’t feel pain, so he mindlessly performed on them without much thought. It seems that the

original thought process has been carried to today's world, the only difference is that people now

know these experiments cause the animals pain but they just don’t care. Take a big time leap all

the way to the 1800’s and 1900’s and we find animal testing had no laws, rules, or regulations as

to how they needed to be performed. Some tests consisted of rewiring the brain and body, as a

physiologist named Ivan Pavlov did in the late 1800’s early 1900’s. “ In order to measure “the

intensity of the salivary reflex,” wrote Pavlov, the dogs were subjected to a “minor operation,

which consists in the transplantation of the opening of the salivary duct from its natural place on

the mucous membrane of the mouth to the outside skin.” A “small glass funnel” was then

attached to the salivary duct opening with a “special cement.” (ProCon.org). This enabled Ivan to

make the dogs salivate on the command of a bell or buzzer. Luckily around this time period,

people also began rising up against animal testing. One notable person was actually the queen of

England at the time, Queen Victoria, who was appalled and disgusted by the stories she had

heard. Sadly, though, this wasn’t enough, as it wasn’t until the 1970’s when real animal rights

laws started to be put in place, although these laws were often ignored by animal testers. But

why wait till then, what was the final straw?

Animals have been suffering since the greek ages, but laws against this weren’t put in

place until very recently. Animals have been suffering through numerous tests and experiments

throughout history, so how bad can they really be. Apparently, the answer is really bad. Testing

runs the gamut from forced chemical exposure all the way to forcing animal models to replicate

human diseases such as depression and cancer. One big example of the horrors of animal testing

is a silver spring monkey experimentation lab discovered by animal rights organization PETA.
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While PETA doesn’t have the best reputation for telling the truth, over exaggerating facts, and

killing the animals they are trying to save, this story is true as proven by the countless numbers

of police officers and non-PETA rescuers who bore witness to the horrific sight. A man named

Edward Taub, who actually had no medical or animal training, ran the Institute for Behavioral

Research (IBR), a research institute that was federally funded in Silver Springs, Maryland. The

IBR had 17 monkeys in their “care” in 1981. After digging further into the facility, and a former

PETA member actually getting a job at the facility, the horrific conditions of the monkeys were

discovered. They lived in small cages, encrusted with years of their own feces and urine, having

never been cleaned, and with many bloody injuries that were never taken care of, as there was no

vet in the facility. Sadly, that was just the beginning, as the experiments was where the real

torture began. Taub wanted to discover if a limb that could not be felt could be used. To figure it

out, Taub severed nerve spinal nerve endings of the monkeys, leading to them being unable to

feel one or two limbs. Then Taub subjugated the moneys to electrocution, food deprivation, and

in one experiment, placed them in a converted refrigerator with an electroshock floor, to get the

moneys to use their limbs. In other experiments the monkeys were tied to a restraint chair by

their necks, waist, ankles, and wrists using packaging tape, with pliers attached tightly to their

skin. Once it was discovered that these monkeys were harmed much more than the law allowed,

pictures and information was sent to the police. Once the police received a warrant to search the

property, they were appalled and shocked. The monkeys were rescued, but sadly the only two

that survived were later euthanized for the extreme amount of suffering they endured. This is

only one story of thousands of cruel animal testing experiments. Laws have been put in place to

stop this cruelty, but with the combination of people refusing to listen and new drugs requiring

testing, people may find it difficult to end the animal testing.

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Just like a coin there is always another side, another point of view, another idea. While

many think that animal testing should be ended, there are also many who thinks it’s pros vastly

outweigh the cons. Many animal testing supporters will argue that animal testing has made some

great contributions to medicine and medical practice, and this is true. The medical university at

Stanford is one supporter of animal testing. Stanford states multiple facts such as “Animals are

biologically very similar to humans. In fact, mice share more than 98% DNA with us,” and

“Animals are susceptible to many of the same health problems as humans – cancer, diabetes,

heart disease, etc.” as well as “ With a shorter life cycle than humans, animal models can be

studied throughout their whole life span and across several generations, a critical element in

understanding how a disease processes and how it interacts with a whole, living biological

system,” (Stanford Medical Center). While these statements are all true, it doesn’t necessarily

mean that animal testing works. For starters, while mice do share 98% DNA with us, rodents

such as mice and rabbits actually only have a 60% success rate when it comes to testing new

drugs or medicines. This also means that a cure for something like cancer or diabetes on a rodent

could very well not work at all for a human. Many of the medicines, around 90%, can not be

used on humans because while they worked for the animals, they were deemed either unsafe or

ineffective after the human trials. Also considering how often these tests are wrong, it makes it

more dangerous for the people who get to try these new drugs before they are FDA approved as

safe or effective. While these animals do have shorter lives, they are still living beings who feel

pain and emotions and undergoing testing their whole lives can still produce an effect on them.

Other animal testing supporters say that animals, mostly rodents, and humans both start and

progress their diseases similarly, so it can be tracked in rodents and can be translated into how it

tracks in humans. This may have been an effective way of tracking diseases in the past, but new
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and modern technology is able to track these diseases in people while it’s happening, without

bringing harm to the person. It would also let doctors know how quickly that person specifically

is progressing, so a plan can be put in place for that person. These examples clearly show why

animal testing should be stopped, yet many wonder what would be done to find the reactions of

medicines and dugs without the animals being tested on first. Luckily there are already many

more accurate and safe ways to find this out.

There actually happen to be many alternatives to animal testing and most are far more

safe and effective too. Many organizations who contribute to animal testing aften ignore and

don’t even mention the possiblility of alternate ways to test new medicines, even though these

alternatives have been around for years. One big alternative is cell cultures, which can be the

cells of almost any creature on the planet, including humans, that can be grown in controlled

conditions into almost any part of the body, including organs. According to Cruelty Free

International’s student page, “Cell cultures have been central to key developments in areas such

as cancers, sepsis, kidney disease and AIDS, and are routinely used in chemical safety testing,

vaccine production and drug development.” Cell cultures can accurately predict a human

reaction to allergies and medicines 90% of the time compared to the 60% on rodents and 72% on

pigs. Cell cultures also have a 100% success rate of identifying toxic chemicals and toxic drugs

that can affect the growth of a human baby while in the mothers womb. Human tissues are

another successful way of testing the progression of disease and regeneration of healthy tissue.

These tissues are typically donated, usually from surgeries, and post-mortem bodies. People who

have donated their bodies to science have provided vast amounts of information to medicine that

cannot be replicated through any other means. When taking a look at the brain of a person with

alzheimers or parkinsons disease, scientists are able to better understand these diseases and have
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even been able to provide important leads to understanding brain regeneration. Once again, this

alternative is cheaper than animal testing. With these new, more accurate, and safer ways of

gathering information, many may wonder why animal testing is still so prominent in todays

world. The honest answer is that people simply don’t wish to change. Humans struggle with

change especially when the current process appears to work well. Yet at the same time, many

people would say that if given the choice between two things that work, where one of the two

choices work better, they would choose the better working option. The fact that humans refuse to

change their approach to testing because it is what they are used to is a sad statement and is the

reason why many animals are forced to suffer through these tests each year.

Animals have suffered throughout history due to human experimentation. First records of

animal experimentation and testing goes back to the Greeks, as people started to learn how

anatomy and physiology works by dissecting and working with live animals. As history went on

animal testing evolved and became less about anatomy and more about testing new medicinal

products and therapies. While this may have worked at first, newer, safer, and more cost efficient

methods have been discovered that could replace animal testing entirely. Sadly though, many

animal testing labratories ignore this information and repeat the common excuse that it is needed

to improve the lives of humans. This has led to some horrific experiments being taken out on

animals, including one where monkeys were electrocuted until they used their paralized limbs.

Most, if not all, of the pain and distress animals have suffered in recent years could have been

easily avoided. With new technological advancements, medical testing can be done on human

tissues and cell cultures which have been proven not only to be more accurate, but also cheaper,

all without avoiding any injuries to animals or people. While animal testing has proven to be

efficent in the past, it is no longer the best way to find medical answers. By opening up their
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minds and hearts to new ideas, people can live an equally safe or even safer lives while knowing

they aren’t injuring any of their fuzzy friends.

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Works Cited

Akkermans, Arnoud, et al. “Animal Testing for Vaccines. Implementing Replacement, Reduction

and Refinement: Challenges and Priorities.” Biologicals, vol. 68, Nov. 2020, pp. 92–107.

EBSCOhost, doi:10.1016/j.biologicals.2020.07.010.

Antidote Europe. “Interview With Dr. Corina Gericke.” October 2018, © 2013-2020 Antidote

Europe. https://antidote-europe.eu/en/interview-with-dr-corina-gericke/

Bryce, Emma. “What Are the Alternatives to Animal Testing?” Livescience.Com, 4 May

2019, www.livescience.com/65401-animal-testing-alternatives.html.

“Cruelty Free International Student Resource.” Cruelty Free International, August 2018,

https://www.crueltyfreeinternational.org/why-we-do-it/alternatives-animal-testing

“Finding Alternatives to Animal Testing.” University of California, 26 Sept. 2019,

www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/finding-alternatives-animal-testing.

“History of Animal Testing - ProCon.Org.” Animal Testing, 24 Feb. 2021,

animal-testing.procon.org/history-of-animal-testing.

Kojima, Hajime, et al. Alternatives to Animal Testing: Proceedings of Asian Congress

2016. 1st ed. 2019, Springer, 2018.

Proulx, Natalie. “Is Animal Testing Ever Justified?” The New York Times, 1 Oct. 2019,

www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/learning/is-animal-testing-ever-justified.html.

“Why Animal Research?” Animal Research at Stanford, 2021,

med.stanford.edu/animalresearch/why-animal-research.html.
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Su-Jin Lee, and Hyang-Ae Lee. “Trends in the Development of Human Stem Cell-Based

Non-Animal Drug Testing Models.” Korean Journal of Physiology &

Pharmacology, vol. 24, no. 6, Nov. 2020, pp. 441–452. EBSCOhost,

doi:10.4196/kjpp.2020.24.6.441.

“Test Subjects” Dir. Alex Lockwood. PETA, Raindance, 2020. Documentary

“The Silver Spring Monkeys: The Case That Launched.” PETA, 5 Dec. 2018,

www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-experimentation/silver-spring-monkeys/?v

2=1.

“Why Animal Research?” Animal Research at Stanford, 2021,

med.stanford.edu/animalresearch/why-animal-research.html.