Should Animals Be Used For Scientific Or Commercial Testing?

Each year, more than 100 1000000 animals—including mice, rats, frogs, dogs, cats, rabbits, hamsters, guinea pigs, monkeys, fish, and birds—are killed in U.South. laboratories for biology lessons, medical grooming, curiosity-driven experimentation, and chemical, drug, nutrient, and cosmetics testing. Before their deaths, some are forced to inhale toxic fumes, others are immobilized in restraint devices for hours, some have holes drilled into their skulls, and others have their peel burned off or their spinal cords crushed. In addition to the torment of the actual experiments, animals in laboratories are deprived of everything that is natural and important to them—they are bars to barren cages, socially isolated, and psychologically traumatized. The thinking, feeling animals who are used in experiments are treated like cipher more than disposable laboratory equipment.

Animal Experiments Are Wasteful and Unreliable

A Pew Research Centre poll plant that 52 per centum of U.S. adults oppose the use of animals in scientific research, and other surveys suggest that the shrinking group that does accept animal experimentation does so simply because it believes it to exist necessary for medical progress.^5,6 The majority of animate being experiments exercise not contribute to improving human health, and the value of the role that animal experimentation plays in most medical advances is questionable.

In an article published in The Journal of the American Medical Association, researchers institute that medical treatments adult in animals rarely translated to humans and warned that "patients and physicians should remain cautious about extrapolating the finding of prominent animal research to the care of human disease … poor replication of even loftier-quality animal studies should exist expected by those who conduct clinical research."^seven

Diseases that are artificially induced in animals in a laboratory, whether they be mice or monkeys, are never identical to those that occur naturally in human beings. And because animate being species differ from one another biologically in many significant ways, it becomes even more than unlikely that brute experiments volition yield results that will be correctly interpreted and applied to the human status in a meaningful way.

For instance, according to former National Cancer Constitute Director Dr. Richard Klausner, "We have cured mice of cancer for decades, and it but didn't work in humans."⁸ This conclusion was echoed by former National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Dr. Elias Zerhouni, who acknowledged that experimenting on animals has been a boondoggle. "We have moved away from studying man affliction in humans," he said. "We all drank the Kool-Aid on that 1, me included. … The problem is that information technology hasn't worked, and it'due south fourth dimension we stopped dancing effectually the problem. … We need to refocus and adjust new methodologies for utilize in humans to empathize disease biology in humans."⁹

The information is sobering: Although at least 85 HIV/AIDS vaccines have been successful in nonhuman primate studies, as of 2015, every ane has failed to protect humans.^x In 1 case, an AIDS vaccine that was shown to exist effective in monkeys failed in human clinical trials because it did non preclude people from developing AIDS, and some believe that information technology made them more susceptible to the disease. According to a report in the British paper The Independent, one conclusion from the failed study was that "testing HIV vaccines on monkeys before they are used on humans, does not in fact work."^eleven

These are not anomalies. The National Institutes of Wellness has stated, "Therapeutic development is a costly, complex and time-consuming process. The average length of time from target discovery to approval of a new drug is well-nigh 14 years. The failure rate during this procedure exceeds 95 percentage, and the cost per successful drug can be $1 billion or more."¹²

Research published in the periodical Annals of Internal Medicine revealed that universities commonly exaggerate findings from creature experiments conducted in their laboratories and "often promote research that has uncertain relevance to human being wellness and exercise not provide cardinal facts or acknowledge of import limitations."¹³ One study of media coverage of scientific meetings concluded that news stories oftentimes omit crucial data and that "the public may be misled about the validity and relevance of the science presented."^fourteen Considering experimenters rarely publish results of failed beast studies, other scientists and the public do not have ready access to data on the ineffectiveness of animal experimentation.

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Funding and Accountability

Through their taxes, charitable donations, and purchases of lottery tickets and consumer products, members of the public are ultimately the ones who—knowingly or unknowingly—fund brute experimentation. One of the largest sources of funding comes from publicly funded government granting agencies such as NIH. Approximately 47 percentage of NIH-funded research involves experimentation on animals, and in 2020, NIH budgeted well-nigh $42 billion for research and evolution.^15,sixteen In addition, many charities––including the March of Dimes, the American Cancer Society, and endless others—use donations to fund experiments on animals. 1-third of the projects funded by the National Multiple Sclerosis Order involve animal experimentation.¹⁷

Despite the vast amount of public funds being used to underwrite animal experimentation, it is nearly impossible for the public to obtain current and complete data regarding the animal experiments that are being carried out in their communities or funded with their taxation dollars. Country open up-records laws and the U.South. Freedom of Information Act can be used to obtain documents and data from state institutions, government agencies, and other federally funded facilities, but individual companies, contract labs, and animal breeders are exempt. In many cases, institutions that are subject to open-records laws fight vigorously to withhold information about brute experimentation from the public.¹⁸

Oversight and Regulation

Despite the countless animals killed each twelvemonth in laboratories worldwide, well-nigh countries have grossly inadequate regulatory measures in place to protect animals from suffering and distress or to prevent them from being used when a not-animal approach is readily bachelor. In the U.Southward., the species most commonly used in experiments (mice, rats, birds, fish, reptiles, and amphibians) comprise 99% of all animals in laboratories but are specifically exempted from even the minimal protections of the federal Animal Welfare Act (AWA).^xix,20 Many laboratories that utilize only these species are not required by law to provide animals with pain relief or veterinary care, to search for and consider alternatives to animal use, to take an institutional commission review proposed experiments, or to be inspected by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) or any other entity. Some estimates indicate that as many as 800 U.South. laboratories are not subject to federal laws and inspections considering they experiment exclusively on mice, rats, and other animals whose employ is largely unregulated.²¹

As for the more than xi,000 facilities that the USDA does regulate (of which more than 1,200 are designated for "enquiry"), just 120 USDA inspectors are employed to oversee their operations.²² Reports take repeatedly concluded that even the minimal standards set forth past the AWA are not beingness met by these facilities, and institutionally based oversight bodies, called Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees (IACUCs), have failed to carry out their mandate. A 1995 report by the USDA's Office of the Inspector General (OIG) "establish that the activities of the IACUCs did not always see the standards of the AWA. Some IACUCs did non ensure that unnecessary or repetitive experiments would non exist performed on laboratory animals."²³ In 2000, a USDA survey of the agency's laboratory inspectors revealed serious problems in numerous areas, including "the search for alternatives [and] review of painful procedures."²⁴ A September 2005 audit study issued by the OIG institute ongoing "problems with the search for alternative research, veterinarian intendance, review of painful procedures, and the researchers' utilise of animals."²⁵ In December 2014, an OIG study documented continuing problems with laboratories declining to comply with the minimal AWA standards and the USDA's weak enforcement deportment failing to deter futurity violations. The audit highlighted that from 2009 to 2011, USDA inspectors cited 531 experimentation facilities for ane,379 violations stemming from the IACUCs' failure to adequately review and monitor the use of animals. The audit also determined that in 2012, the USDA reduced its penalties to AWA violators by an boilerplate of 86 percent, even in cases involving animal deaths and egregious violations.²⁶

Research co-authored by PETA documented that, on boilerplate, animal experimenters and laboratory veterinarians incorporate a combined 82 percent of the membership of IACUCs at leading U.S. institutions. A whopping 98.half dozen percent of the leadership of these IACUCs was also made up of animal experimenters. The authors observed that the ascendant role played by creature experimenters on these committees "may dilute input from the few IACUC members representing animal welfare and the full general public, contribute to previously-documented committee bias in favor of approval animal experiments and reduce the overall objectivity and effectiveness of the oversight system."²⁷ Even when facilities are fully compliant with the law, animals who are covered tin be burned, shocked, poisoned, isolated, starved, forcibly restrained, addicted to drugs, and brain-damaged. No procedures or experiments, regardless of how trivial or painful they may be, are prohibited by federal law. When valid non-animal research methods are available, no federal law requires experimenters to utilize such methods instead of animals.

Alternatives to Fauna Testing

A high-profile report published in the prestigious BMJ (formerly British Medical Journal) documenting the ineffectiveness and waste of experimentation on animals ended that "if research conducted on animals continues to be unable to reasonably predict what can be expected in humans, the public'south continuing endorsement and funding of preclinical animal research seems misplaced."²⁸

Research with human volunteers, sophisticated computational methods, and in vitro studies based on human cells and tissues are critical to the advocacy of medicine. Cutting-edge non-animate being research methods are available and have been shown time and once more to exist more accurate than crude animate being experiments.²⁹ However, this modern research requires a different outlook, 1 that is artistic and empathetic and embraces the underlying philosophy of ethical science. Human health and well-beingness can as well exist promoted by adopting nonviolent methods of scientific investigation and concentrating on the prevention of affliction before information technology occurs, through lifestyle modification and the prevention of further ecology pollution and degradation. The public is becoming more than aware and more vocal virtually the cruelty and inadequacy of the electric current research system and is demanding that tax dollars and charitable donations not be used to fund experiments on animals.

History of Animal Testing

PETA created "Without Consent"—an interactive timeline featuring virtually 200 stories of animal experiments from the by century—to open up people's eyes to the long history of suffering that'due south been inflicted on nonconsenting animals in laboratories and to claiming people to rethink this exploitation. Visit "Without Consent" to larn more most harrowing animal experiments throughout history and how you tin help create a improve future for living, feeling beings.

Without Consent

You Can Aid Stop Brute Testing

Well-nigh all federally funded research is paid for with your tax dollars. Your lawmakers needs to know that yous don't want your coin used to pay for animal experiments.

Urge your members of Congress to endorse PETA'due south Enquiry Modernization Deal, which provides a roadmap for modernizing U.South. investment in enquiry by ending funding for useless experiments on animals and investing in effective research that's relevant to humans.

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Not a U.S. Resident? Accept Activity Here

Animal Testing Facts and Figures

United States (2019)^1,2

• Nearly i million animals are held captive in laboratories or used in experiments (excluding rats, mice, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and agricultural animals used in agricultural experiments), plus an estimated 100 1000000 mice and rats

Canada (2020)^three

• 5.07 one thousand thousand animals used in experiments
• 94,543 animals subjected to "severe pain near, at, or above the pain tolerance threshold of unanesthetized conscious animals"

Uk(2020)⁴

• two.88 million procedures on animals
• Of the 1.4 million experiments completed in 2020, 57,600 were assessed equally "severe," including "long-term illness processes where assist with normal activities such equally feeding and drinking are required or where meaning deficits in behaviours/activities persist."

References

¹Animal and Establish Health Inspection Service, U.Due south. Section of Agronomics, "Annual Report Animal Usage by Financial Year: Total Number of Animals Research Facilities Used in Regulated Activities (Column B)" and "Annual Report Beast Usage by Fiscal Year: Total Number of Animals Inquiry Facilities used in Regulated Activities (Column F)," 27 Apr. 2021.
ⁱⁱMadhusree Mukerjee, "Speaking for the Animals: A Veterinarian Analyzes the Turf Battles That Accept Transformed the Animal Laboratory," Scientific American, Aug. 2004.
ⁱⁱⁱCanadian Council on Animal Care,"CCAC 2020 Animal Data Report," 2021
^iv U.K. Government, "Almanac Statistics of Scientific Procedures on Living Animals, Great United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland 2020," Home Function, xv July 2021.
⁵Cary Funk and Meg Hefferon, "Most Americans Accept Genetic Engineering science of Animals That Benefits Human being Health, but Many Oppose Other Uses," Pew Research Center, 16 Aug. 2018
⁶Peter Aldhous and Andy Coghlan, "Let the People Speak," New Scientist 22 May 1999.
⁷Daniel Chiliad. Hackam, G.D., and Donald A. Redelmeier, M.D., "Translation of Research Evidence From Animals to Human," The Periodical of the American Medical Association 296 (2006): 1731-ii.
^eightMarlene Simmons et al., "Cancer-Cure Story Raises New Questions," Los Angeles Times half-dozen May 1998.
⁹Rich McManus, "Ex-Director Zerhouni Surveys Value of NIH Inquiry," NIH Record 21 June 2013.
^xJarrod Bailey, "An Cess of the Part of Chimpanzees in AIDS Vaccine Enquiry," Alternatives to Laboratory Animals 36 (2008): 381-428.
^xiSteve Connor and Chris Green, "Is It Time to Give up the Search for an AIDS Vaccine?" The Contained 24 Apr. 2008.
¹²National Institutes of Health, "About New Therapeutic Uses," National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences 9 October. 2019.
¹³Steve Woloshin, Chiliad.D., Yard.Southward., et al., "Printing Releases past Academic Medical Centers: Not And then Bookish?" Annals of Internal Medicine 150 (2009): 613-viii.
¹⁴Steven Woloshin and Lisa Schwartz, "Media Reporting on Enquiry Presented at Scientific Meetings: More Caution Needed," The Medical Journal of Australia 184 (2006): 576-80.
¹⁵Diana Due east. Pankevich et al., "International Animate being Enquiry Regulations: Impact on Neuroscience Enquiry," The National Academies (2012).
¹⁶National Institutes of Health, "Budget," (last accessed on 3 May 2021).
¹⁷Pankevich et al.
^eighteenDeborah Ziff, "On Campus: PETA Sues UW Over Admission to Research Records," Wisconsin State Journal 5 Apr. 2010.
¹⁹U.Due south. Department of Agronomics, Animal and Plant Wellness Inspection Service, "Fauna Welfare, Definition of Beast," Federal Register, 69 (2004): 31513-4.
²⁰Justin Goodman et al., "Trends in Animal Use at US Research Facilities," Journal of Medical Ethics 0(2015): ane-iii.
²¹The Associated Press, "Animate being Welfare Act May Not Protect All Critters," seven May 2002.
²²U.S. Department of Agriculture, Animal and Found Health Inspection Service, "Beast Care: Search."
²³U.S. Department of Agriculture, Function of Inspector General, "APHIS Fauna Care Program, Inspection and Enforcement Activities," inspect study, 30 Sept. 2005.
²⁴U.Due south. Department of Agronomics, Fauna and Plant Wellness Inspection Service, "USDA Employee Survey on the Effectiveness of IACUC Regulations," Apr. 2000.
²⁵U.Due south. Department of Agriculture, Office of Inspector General, "APHIS Animate being Intendance Program, Inspection and Enforcement Activities," audit study, 30 Sept. 2005.
²⁶U.Due south. Department of Agriculture, Office of Inspector Full general, "Creature and Plant Health Inspection Service Oversight of Research Facilities," audit report, December. 2014.
²⁷Lawrence A. Hansen et al., "Analysis of Animal Research Ethics Committee Membership at American Institutions," Animals 2 (2012): 68-75.
²⁸Pandora Pound and Michael Bracken, "Is Creature Research Sufficiently Evidence Based To Exist A Cornerstone of Biomedical Research?," BMJ (2014): 348.
²⁹Junhee Seok et al., "Genomic Responses in Mouse Models Poorly Mimic Human Inflammatory Diseases," Proceedings of the National University of Sciences 110 (2013): 3507-12.

Source: https://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-experimentation/animals-used-experimentation-factsheets/animal-experiments-overview/

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