The For And Against Of The Animal Testing

Imagine being locked up inside a small and cramped cage with nothing but a feces-filled water bowl that has not been changed for 5 days. The feeling of losing your mind has become inevitable and it seems like “surviving”is impossible. Glancing around the room, you see many creatures are in pain. A mother has been forcefully torn from her newborn; she is going insane as she looks desperately for her child, a cat is screaming in agony after it has been performed a vivisection on. A garbage bin contains piles of animals rendered useless after vicious quantities of drug intake.You then notice a hand reaching out to grab hold and you wonder.. Is it over? Animal research is a controversial topic and has been a popular conversation among the public and in veterinary doctors. Animal testing is wrong and these innocent creatures should not go through this kind of suffering. In all respects, animal testing should be banned because it is inhumane, the test results are often not useful, and there are better alternatives for this issue.

Every day, mice, rats, cats, dogs,rabbits, hamsters, guinea pigs,birds and primates are used. They don’t have a voice to speak for themselves. Animals are caught and captured from the wild, stuffed into little crates, and tested for any issues before being relocated. Furthermore, the experimental laboratories shall keep them for as long as they need. This can sometimes mean animals are sentenced to death to serve and submit to these awful treatments. The testing they encounter involve injecting, force-feeding, shocking, dripping medications into their eyes and skin, inhaling toxins, embedding wires inside their brains and repetitive surgeries. In most cases, animals don’t even receive painkillers or medication after trails. In addition, animals experience pain as humans do. The feeling of pain is something that can be felt internally and expressed through facial and actions; it is a mental indication. They may jolt, shriek, whimper, or scream when they cry out in pain. Whenever they are physically abused, it can lead to neurotic related behaviour that leaves them disabled. Pacing around in circles, ripping their fur out, and biting themselves are only a couple of the things that could be carried out. We learn to respect each other and try our best to not hurt people around us; why can’t we have the same relationship with wildlife?

What’s more, is that major results of animal testing end up shown as unsuccessful and useless. According to the National Institute of Health, it was shown that experiments end up neglecting about 92% of their research due to failing when entering the clinical evaluation. The other 8% was shown as medications that had side effects that were not presented in animal testing. Animals don’t have the same disease compared to humans. Multiple examples include heart diseases, cancer, HIV, Parkinson’s disease, and many more. Dr. Richard Klauser, former director of the US National Cancer Research states that: “The history of cancer research has been the history of curing cancer in the mouse. We have cured cancer in mice for decades and it simply didn’t work on humans.” This can show that not only in mice but most of the 100 million animals used, do not always show the same results as expected and can be misleading. Another report has shown that the US Drug & Food Administrator in 2017, only ended certifying 46 new drugs after testing on 115 million animals globally. It was concluded that these drugs weren’t even needed as common cures but were rare diseases.

Lastly, observations usually turn out as unreliable and dangerous. This is because both species have a huge biology difference; humans and animals have different responses to illnesses,substances and healing approaches. Not all of the assumptions that the chances of imitating an animal as their “model” will not always have the same effect. Not everyone needs new shades of lipstick when there are already so many shades available. Dripping these cosmetic products into the eyes and skins of rabbits to sell in shops don’t benefit the society- what more could we ask for? Research have found that the draize skin irritation in rabbits will only show up 60% efficiency on humans. In other cases, using remodeled human skin can boost the results up to 86%. Science is expanding and scientists are gradually finding new ways to improve the lifestyle of humans. Alternatives include cell manipulation, human tissue from donors, computer models, synthetic skin, and volunteer studies. With that, animal testing should not be limiting the opportunity of opening up to more effective methods of analysis.

There is alway an option to approach a scenario differently. Then why is it taking so long for others to understand that animal testing is beyond cruel? If people were to imagine themselves in the shoes of these creatures, would they want to live everyday in pain? Essentially, animals should be free of these torture devices and know that they have the right to be unconfined, not impersonated, killed or carry trails out on. The purpose that many need to understand is that animals aren’t for people to use but instead to cherish. With that, stopping harsh treatments, rid of unnecessary testing, and have more options to animal testing. Just imagine it: asking yourself the question “We don’t have a solution for animal testing.”..But instead, “We don’t have a solution for animal testing just yet.” Would the world not already have humans and animals living peacefully together?