Animal Experimentation: Ethics, Failures, and Alternatives

Introduction: The Legacy of Animal Experimentation

Nineteenth-century physiologist Claude Bernard first began practicing experimental medicine on animals. Bernard believed it was immoral to conduct laboratory experiments on humans if those tests had not first been proven safe on animals (LaFollette and Shanks, 1994). As the most intelligent species in the animal kingdom, humans are constantly discovering new and innovative ideas to improve their lifestyle and quality of life. Evidence of this advancement is visible in the average increase in human life expectancy — from 45 years at the turn of the 19th century to 73 years in the 21st century. Although a number of medical breakthroughs in recent history have resulted from intensive research using animals as test subjects in initial clinical trials, the number of experiments that have ended in failure — and consequently cost the lives of animals — far exceeds the number of successful ones.

Experimentation on animals is not morally right; it is cruel. What happens to these animals after the experiments have ended? In the article "An Embarrassment of Chimpanzees," Joseph D'Agnese examined some of the shortcomings of using animals in experimentation (Discover, 2002). When laboratories close, chimpanzees are either sent to another laboratory or to sanctuaries. Many of them, as a result of experiments, carry transmittable diseases such as AIDS and HIV, which make them difficult to handle and care for. They require special care, and their diseases prevent them from being released into the wild, where they might interact with and infect other animals. Scientists who work with chimpanzees claim that valuable data is collected from biopsies, inoculations, and knockouts — a precursor to clinical trials with human subjects. Animal rights activists insist, however, that animal-free science has come of age and that animal sacrifice is wholly unnecessary.

There are numerous experiments being conducted by research centers across America, sponsored by grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), to discover solutions for virtually every human ailment. It is becoming increasingly apparent, however, that the results of animal trials are not always applicable to humans. In the article "A Critical Look at Animal Experimentation," the authors argue that there are better and more effective ways of arriving at valid conclusions (Cohen et al., 1998). Supporters of vivisection — tests, experiments, and educational exercises involving harm to animals — have claimed that these experiments play an important role in all medical advances. While there have been benefits in the past from using lab rats and rhesus monkeys to demonstrate new techniques in medicine, and from using animals in medical school laboratories to master dissection skills, the landscape has fundamentally changed.

Modern technology has transformed the research and medical arenas. New and continuously improving simulation models are available to researchers who wish to use them. Medical skills can now be honed without dissecting and killing animals. If simulators can teach pilots to fly planes in different weather conditions, they can equally be used to train young doctors in the medical skills needed for their work.

Scientific Failures and Species Differences

Various experiments have demonstrated that animal testing and experimentation do not always yield the same results as those seen in humans. As humans evolved, they lost certain resistances and became more susceptible to impurities and infections than many animals. For example, in the 1940s, human clinical investigation strongly indicated that asbestos caused cancer, yet animal studies repeatedly failed to demonstrate this. Similarly, studies of human patients had already shown by 1963 a strong correlation between cigarette smoking and lung cancer; however, almost all experimental efforts to produce lung cancer in animals had failed (Cohen, Kaufman, Ruttenberg, and Fano, 1998). While these experiments produced inconclusive results, injuries and death were inflicted on thousands of animals worldwide. Estimates of the number of animals tortured and killed annually in U.S. laboratories vary widely — from 17 to 70 million animals (PETA, n.d.).

Dr. Arie Brecher, a pediatrician from Holon, Israel, stated in a speech at the International Congress of Doctors Against Vivisection: "Animals are completely different from humans, and no animal species can serve as an experimental model for man. Each animal has a genetic code of its own, which is a fixed datum, and characteristically unique in each species" (Brecher, 1989). With the sequencing of the mouse genome and ongoing work on the human genome, it is clear that even minor variations in DNA may cause different animals to react differently to the same environment. While there is similarity between the DNA of different animals, the differences are critical.

A fundamental flaw in Claude Bernard's thinking becomes apparent here. He claimed, "Since all living matter obeys the same physiological laws, experiments on animals can yield significant biomedical truths about humans." This has been proved false. Strychnine, one of the deadliest poisons to humans, is harmless to monkeys, chickens, and guinea pigs. Sheep can consume enormous quantities of arsenic, which is fatal to humans in small amounts. Hemlock is a deadly poison for humans, but is consumed without ill effect by mice, sheep, goats, and horses.

Many scientists are now questioning the results obtained from animal experiments. Various factors — such as the stress induced by caging animals — can alter both behavior and the biochemical makeup of those animals. No experimentation carried out on one species in an environment other than its own natural habitat can be reliably extrapolated to any other species, including humans.

Dangerous Drugs and Corporate Accountability

Animal tests do not adequately protect humans from dangerous drugs and substances. Companies often use these tests merely as a liability shield rather than a genuine safety measure. Profit is the foremost goal of a corporate entity, and the frequent absence of ill effects in animals enables pharmaceutical companies to push for a drug's adoption in the human market. Phenylbutazone (an anti-inflammatory), Thalidomide (a sleeping pill and anti-nausea drug), and Clofibrate (an anti-cholesterol drug) all had fatal side effects in humans despite showing no adverse effects in the animals on which they were tested (PRISM). A General Accounting Office report released in May 1990 found that more than half of the prescription drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration between 1976 and 1985 caused side effects serious enough to require withdrawal from the market or significant relabeling (PETA, n.d.).