Animal experimentation

To improve basic knowledge of biological systems and disease processes

To develop new diagnostic techniques

To develop new treatments and test them

To produce biological products such as vaccines, hormones etc.

To test product safety. Experimentation in animals has lead to such things as antibiotics, analgesics, vaccines which have enabled doctors to eliminate many diseases, and advances in medical technology, such as life-support machines.

A few specific examples from Chang (11) point to the great benefits to mankind of animal experimentation:

1885 - Pasteur develops a vaccine against rabies using rabbits and other animals

1891 - scientists drew blood from a horse to fight diphtheria, a severe respiratory disease which killed thousands in the late 1800s

1952 - Jonas Salk develops a vaccine for polio using monkeys, rats and mice

Along the way, animal rights organizations grew, following the founding of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA), founded in 1866 (Chang 18). In 1951, Christine Stevens founded the Animal Welfare Institute to monitor the treatment of laboratory animals, and in 1966 the government passed the Animal Welfare Act. Going one step furt

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of animals ôtortured and killed annually in U. S. laboratoriesö range from 17 million to 70 million - a very wide range indeed, which casts doubts on the accuracy of their information gathering sources. In 1999, the Animal Liberation Front, another violent animal rights group, claimed responsibility for ransacking laboratories at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, stealing more than 100 research animals, and causing an estimated $2 million in direct damage, apart from disrupting dozens of ongoing studies (Lamberg 619). At the same time, other animal rights protesters vandalized three laboratories at the University of California in San Francisco - one of which was a cell culture facility established to reduce the need for experimentation on animals. Not satisfied with this senseless destruction, the protesters went on to break windows and set a fire in the home of a researcher who lived in the area. Earlier, in 1990, animal rights protesters ransacked the office of Adrian Morrison, DVM, and the University of Pennsylvania School of veterinary medicine, and sent letters about him to the local media, colleagues and neighbors (Lamberg 619). He found the experience psychically damaging, and it disrupted his work for
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2138
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page)

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