1

ANIMAL TESTING
Alyssa Pham & Lily Nguyen

CONS ?

PROS ?
 2

INTRODUCTION:

For the longest time, animal testing has been a

controversial topic that we, as consumers always have
different opinions on. There will always be two side of
every problem: the supporting side and the opposing
side. Most of the opinions that people usually have is
biased instead of actual background knowledge that
they can prove if it’s right or wrong. Animal testing goes
back to around 400 years ago, when one of the first
famous researchers William Harvey was curious and
discovered how blood circulates around the body. The
modern era of animal testing began around 150 years
ago, but it was quite different compared to the old
version. People started to stop using painkiller on animal when they do experiment, so it made the
animals suffers more. Animal testing has contributed to many life-saving cures and medicines but
there are still many arguments on if performing experiment on animals is cruel and unnecessary. So
why is animal testing bad beside its morally wrong? What is the scientific and logic side that prove
animal testing is bad or good?

PROS:

One of the biggest argument that supports animal testing is that animal testing has contributed
to many life-saving cures and treatments. Animal research has helped with major advances in
medicine like treating cancer, brain injuries, malaria and many other diseases. New treatments like
penicillin, blood transfusion and kidney transplants were also discovered from researching animals.
Now, animals are also being researched and tested on to cure cancer. Without these animals,
medicine wouldn’t be able to advance far as it is right now.

Insulin for Diabetes:

Around the 20th century, the only medication for diabetes was having a strict low-calorie diet
and no carbohydrate diet. Though, it had bad effects like slow starvation and draining patient’s
energy. Patients had to be committed and follow it but many gave up. The discovery of insulin was
 3

made by two people: Frederick Banting (surgeon) and his assistant Charles Herbert. They started
their study on May 1821 by experimenting duct ligation on dogs. Duct Ligation is basically a complete
surgical removal of the pancreas which is also pancreatomy. The pancreas was removed and
extracted. This left behind acini cells that produced insulin. The extraction contained sugar from the
urine of dogs in the pancreas and these dogs showed signs of glycosuria. Then, the insulin was
combined with some proteins and tested on several animals with signs of diabetes. As a result, it
showed that injecting insulin into these animals lowered blood sugar. With that, it became something
people tried testing on humans and it became successful and saved millions of lives. Insulin in Latin
meant “island” and came from “isles” that was made by a German medical student, Paul Langerhans.
He discovered the acini cells in the pancreatic tissue.

Another reason why animal testing should be allowed is that they are considered an
appropriate research subject because they are similar to human beings in many ways. In schools,
biology was the main subject that talks about the functions and structures of animals and plant cells.
To understand the inside of animals more, dissection is something that is offered to students. This is
a great way for students to have a hands on experience to look at the animal’s body themselves. It
doesn’t have to be the whole body; it could be a specific organ in the body. Through evolution, it is
said that we share 99% of our DNA with chimpanzees and 98% similar genetically to mice. All
animals including humans have the same set of organs (heart, lung, liver etc.) and because of that, it
also means that we have similar conditions and illnesses.

Fetal Pigs:
Fetal Pigs are used to study the mammal anatomy which is also what we are. The sizes of
their organs are small so it’s easy for us to find and identify. Pigs has an internal anatomy similar to
humans. Some internal organs that we share are the livers, intestines, lungs, stomach etc.
Sheep Brains:
Another animal that we experiment on are sheep brains. The brain is a part of the nervous
system and controls everything in our bodies. Sheep brain dissection is a good way for medical
students and students who are planning on going into surgery. Students will get learn about memory
and where it’s taken place. This will help doctors treat patients since they have knowledge to what
kind of sickness the patients have.
 4

Animal testing is used many ways. The most popular use for animal testing is for health care
and cosmetics. These two things need to be tested on animals to ensure their safety for us to use.
Cosmetics is a very huge thing in the beauty community. Thousands of women wear makeup every
single day for school and work. Some even put on full face makeup. Skincare is also very important to
us. Everyone wants to look good and have healthy skin. Skincare is meant to make our skins soft,
clear and healthy. An average American woman applies on about 12 personal care product everyday
so safety is super important. That is why what is inside the product you are using for your skin is so
important. There’s a lot of chemicals involved inside products that cosmetologists/dermatologists put
effort into making so that when someone puts it on, their skin doesn’t have a bad reaction.

Rabbits used in Cosmetics:

Rabbits in the past has also been used for many other tests. The Draize Test is the best
known test used on rabbits. It involves applying a small amount of substance onto the animal’s eye or
skin for several hours and checking if any irritation occurs a few weeks later. In the cosmetic industry,
new makeup is created and testing all the time. Makeup contains lots of toxic chemical that needs to
be checked and tested on several times to make sure it’s safe to be sold to customers. With the help
of rabbits and other animals, it’ll insure that the product is safe to be put onto the face.

CONS:

Firstly, animal testing is cruel and inhumane. People think that just because they’re animal,
they can’t feel pain. This way of thinking is so ridiculous and atrocious. Animals that are kept in
captivity have to suffer over and over again just for scientists to find a “cure” or “medicine” for
humans. The worst part of the experiment is to know how badly animals get treated. According to
Humane Society International, animals used in experiments are commonly subjected to force feeding,
 5

force inhalation, food and water deprivation, prolonged periods of physical restraint, the infliction of
burns and other wounds to study the healing process … After most of the experiments, animals get
killed by breaking their neck, inhale chemical gases or they just can’t stay alive after thousands of
attempt that scientist try to study about the experiment. People with a state of mind that believes that
killing animals is normal and not a crime are totally unethical. We have been learning from our parent,
school and the society that we have to treat people nicely but how can you do it if you can’t even treat
animal the same way. Not only people around us taught us that, religious traditions also tell us to be
merciful to animals. So, we should not cause them suffering by experimenting on them.

Secondly, not every experiment that involves animals

gives accurate information and even scientists who got
something out of the experiments, some of them are never be
used again for anything useful. What this means is thousands
of animals died without actually being dedicated to anything in
this world. It’s sad to know that animals sacrificed their life just
for people to do crazy experiments on them and they don’t
even need or use that research to benefit human. Scientists
that desperately try to test their medicines on their “guinea pig”
which is wasting animals’ lives, and as a result, it gives out unreliable result that can cost hundreds of
lives. Lots of incredible medicine got discovered thanks to animal testing but it doesn’t mean that it’s
going to happen every time we use animal as an experimental object.

The last reason why animals testing should be used is that animals and humans are not the
same, something that good for animal, doesn’t mean it’s good for human and vice versa. Something
that is considered good for animals doesn’t mean it’s good for humans and vice versa. Generally,
animals are not an inanimate object that people just kill and do experiments on. That’s a waste of
lives, time and money when you unconsciously kill thousands of animal just to do “research” on them.
There were hundreds of cases on medical developments that scientists have created from doing
experiments on animals and gave negative responses from us. Example for this statement is Vioxx, a
drug used to treat arthritis, was found to be safe when tested in monkeys, but has been estimated to
have cause round 320,000 heart attacks and strokes, and 140,000 deaths worldwide. As you can
see, it’s not only you who waste millions of animal’s lives but also can cause diseases and death to
people. Animal and humans are not the same. Animals do not get many of diseases like we do and
 6

their body structures and DNA are barely the same like us. Paul Furlong, Professor of Clinical
Neuroimaging at Aston University (UK), states that "It's very hard to create an animal model that even
equates closely to what we're trying to achieve in the human." You can still make medicines that were
discovered by animals without killing thousands of lives. There is no evidence that animal
experiments were essential in making major medical advances. If you have enough money and
resources that were devoted to animal-free alternatives, other solutions can be found. There will
always be solutions to solve your problems, the only thing that matter is do you want it or not.

PROPAGANDA:

Animal Testing has become such a big

issue. Most of the propaganda used is to
persuade the stop of animal testing. Appeal to
Pity is when someone tries to win support for an
argument or idea by exploiting his or her
opponent's feelings of pity or guilt. This
propaganda is used mainly to make people feel
pity on whatever is being shown. The
propaganda before shows one of the woman’s
eye is being infected, swollen and bleeding. The
woman is a representation of animals being
used for testing. These animals are being forced
to have a needle through their eye. They had to sacrifice themselves for beauty of humans. That
represents the other side of the woman’s faces face where it’s all pretty and perfect. Another thing
that catches people’s attention when they see this is the caption written. When people look at the
poster, they know that it’s referring to animals but it shows a picture of a woman instead. Since the
woman is also like us, a person, it’s more likely for us to feel the pain and have pity of it. The poster
adds a caption that says “How would you like it?”. This is used to make people think about it in their
own situation. How would they like it if they are the one being tested on? As a result, this will make
people want to do something about it like contacting companies or health departments to find a way
to stop animal testing. These people will feel bad for the animals.
 7

CONCLUSION:

Alyssa’s opinion:
In my opinion, I think that animal testing should be banned. I think that everything is wrong with
using animals as test subjects. Not only is that inhumane but it’s also dangerous. Animal testing is
one of the things that relate to extinction. Many animals have gone extinct or is on the verge of
extinction due to people hunting them down and getting their resources. The environment that the
animals are raised in can affect the experiments. If the animals live in a poor condition area, it’s more
likely that they have sickness and when these animals get tested on, there wouldn’t be good results.
At the end, these animals will die. Also, illness can spread really easier through direct contact. It’s an
unsafe way to test something. There are many other methods to test something without the use of
animals. At this generation, technology has advanced so much and a portion of it has contributed to
medicine. Business have slowly stopped using animals as test subjects. Some cosmetic brands that
doesn’t test their products on animals have written ‘cruelty-free’ on the packaging of their products.

Lily’s opinion:
Personally, I chose the objective side to do research on for a reason. My opinion on animal
testing is hardly positive and a little bit bias. But after I did my research on it, I can say that I have
more logic and knowledge to argue that animal testing is totally wrong. As a person who loves
animals, I think it’s cruel to do that kind of action on animal. Like I said in my essay, animal are not
the same as human and even though a lot of medicines got discovered by using animals, it doesn’t
mean we will always be that lucky. Animal testing isn’t the only solution that we can use to find
medicines and cures, we just have to think for another solution because we have all the technology
and people we need to figure it out.
 8

RESOURCES:
http://www.animalresearch.info/en/medical-advances/nobel-prizes/the-discovery-of-insulin/
https://animal-testing.procon.org/
https://speakingofresearch.com/facts/medical-benefits/
https://www.crueltyfreeinternational.org/why-we-do-it/arguments-against-animal-testing