The use of animals in scientific experiments may well be considered one of the most cruel practices that humans inflict on other animals. We deliberately expose non-human animals to the dangers and maladies that affect humans in a misguided attempt to ensure healthier lives for ourselves.

Cosmetics testing is perhaps the most cruel and unnecessary element of animal experimentation. The industry standard LD-50 test is a good example. The experiment is used to determine the dosage required to kill 50% of the animals used in the test. Over the years the LD-50 test, which is used to test pharmaceutical products, has been repeated on the same species of animals and with the same chemicals despite access to historical results. Though many cosmetic and household product companies have agreed to stop animal testing, a number of them (like Procter and Gamble) continue to torture and kill animals to supposedly make the world safe for lip gloss and laundry detergent. This kind of experimentation is completely unnecessary, as evidenced by a recent long-term ban on cosmetics testing in the European Union.

Medical testing, too, is replete with wasteful practices and irrelevant results. Animals other than humans, no matter how similar, are not close enough approximations to justify using the results to find human cures. Penicillin, a widely used antibiotic of immense importance to humans, is fatal to guinea pigs. The use of animal tests involving monkeys is widely known to have delayed a polio vaccine for as long as twenty-five years. Further, one of the initially developed polio vaccines based on animal tests has been linked to a deadly form of cancer called mesothelioma.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration obstinately requires animal testing of all pharmaceutical drugs. The Animal Welfare Act, which does not protect mice, rats, and birds, contains the provision that nothing in these rules, regulations, or standards shall affect or interfere with the design, outline, or performance of actual research or experimentation by a research facility as determined by such research facility. Self-regulation by research facilities is clearly a conflict of interest, but is currently the only method of oversight at most research facilities, including the University of Washington.

Animals do not exist simply to serve as biological playgrounds for scientists. There are a number of cruelty free choices that we can make in our everyday lives to ensure that we personally do not contribute to animal experimentation. Please see the resources provided below.