Animal Experimentation essays

Animal Experimentation essays The United States government should come up with alternatives to animal experimentation. The use of animals in research, testing, and education is an issue of increasing concern to the American public. An increasing number of adults and teenagers are concerned about the welfare of laboratory animals. Animal testing, or vivisection, is the testing of cosmetics, drugs, household products and many other everyday items on animals. Vivisection literally means cutting alive. And that is exactly what happens. Every second, of every day, of every year, an animal dies in research labs in the United States. That means that while you have been reading this, about 30 defenseless animals have died in a laboratory (Harris). It is impossible to know the exact number of animals that have died in the name of science. This is due partly to the fact that some scientists refuse to disclose the details of their experiments. However, using the facts that are available, it is estimated that academic researchers in America alone use between 17 and 22 million animals per year. The cosmetics industry uses about a million more animals (Coleman). Animal experimentation is said to be necessary for the welfare and health of humans. This is simply not true. Animal experiments mislead doctors and the general public. Diseases such as cancer, which are artificially induced in laboratory animals, have no relationship to the diseases that affect humans, because these diseases are largely caused by lifestyle and pollution (Vivisection). Many people that are not familiar with the issue of animal experimentation are concerned that if we dont experiment on animals we will be forced to experiment on humans. Isnt this already the case? When we take a new drug, we are part of an experiment, because we differ from the animals on which the drug was tested. Drugs, which have minor or no side effects on animals, have ca ...