Christine Crawford English 015.016

December 7, 2011 Since 8th grade I have always wanted to be a veterinarian. Vet schools, however, require students to have a lot of different animal experiences prior to applying. Last summer I spend days looking for places to volunteer on a farm to get some large animal experience, but nothing ever seemed to work out. Disappointed, my mother came home one day and told me she talked to some people at work and was able to get me an internship at the University at Buffalo Lab Animal Facilities! Great, I thought to myself, lab animals. I’ve heard about places like this before, they don’t sound very nice. Animals are so mistreated and not taken care of; this is going to be awful. Upon working the first couple days, I realized how wrong all those assumptions about lab animal facilities had been. The facility that I was now an intern in was beautiful! The animals were so well taken care of, and there were so many procedures and rules you had to follow to make sure there was no spread of diseases and that each animal was comfortable and could not become sick or be mistreated in any way. How on Earth do people think these places are so bad? I thought to myself. The research that went on in the facility was also quite impressive. Again I thought, why do so many people want to ban animal testing? Just from this one experience of working in the facilities over the summer it became very clear to see that animal testing is most certainly not cruel to animals in any way, and it is also a vital resource in today’s society for the betterment and advancement of human medicine and health. People have been examining and experimenting with animals for centuries; there are records that date back to even to the 2nd century A.D. If animal testing has been so common throughout all of history, why is it such a controversial issue in today’s society? Animals are susceptible to many of the same health problems that humans face, and so this makes research into these problems possible. Also, “because animals have a much shorter life span than humans, especially smaller species such as mice and rats, it is a lot easier to perform these tests on animals to find results at a much faster pace,” (“Animal Experimentation”). This also allows researchers to see how generations of animals will be effected later on because it is possible to have multiple generations living in a short period of time. Research animals are used in many different types of research that are beneficial to human health and medicine. A large majority of animals used in research are used in biomedical research, which is “a medical discipline based on principles of the natural sciences, particularly biology and biochemistry,” (“Research Animals”). In other words, these animals are used to learn more about the body and how certain substances, toxins, and other organisms affect the body. Animals are also used for drug testing. The main things looked at by researchers in these tests would be the toxic side effects of a drug, the appropriate dosage levels, and how quickly the drug is excreted by the body. These tests are most important to human health because if a substance is released for human use and consumption, but is too toxic in a certain way, humans may die from the product. It is much better to let a couple mice die for being exposed to too much toxicity than letting a couple humans die by the same effects. Animals are also used in other areas of medicine, such as product testing, dissection, and surgical/medical training and behavior research. Many industrial and consumer products are tested on animals to make sure they are safe for human use. Tests can be used to see if substances, such as common house-hold items like shampoo or bleach, are toxic to skin, or only toxic if ingested or if the substance gets in the eyes, and how toxic the substance actually is. Animals used for dissection and surgical/medical training are used for students to learn more about the anatomy and physiology of a

body. This type of animal use is very necessary for both Human and Veterinary Medicine. Veterinarians cannot just go into practice without obviously learning the major anatomy of certain animals and learn how to fix problems that may arise from different organs during surgeries. However, “many schools are now using animal cadavers donated by people whose pets or livestock have died of natural causes”, (“Research Animals”). People entering into the human medical field would most likely be doing dissections on human cadavers, but it is probable that they start out learning basic anatomy by dissecting smaller animals and learning to distinguish organs in that fashion first. Many people believe that the animals that are involved in animal testing are not very well taken care of. According to the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) Organization, there are “millions of mice, rats, rabbits, primates, cats, dogs, and other animals [that] are locked inside cold, barren cages in laboratories across the country. They languish in pain, ache with loneliness and long to roam free and use their minds,” (“Animals Used for Experimentation”). These assumptions, however, are not completely true. From my own experience working in the laboratory as a caretaker, I know that the animals are not in “cold, barren cages” and “ache with loneliness.” Each room has a thermometer in it and temperature readings are taken 3 times a day to make sure all the animals live in a comfortable and natural environment, unless a room is specifically very warm or very cold because the experiment requires it to be so. The cages are neither barren nor lonely either. For mice and rats, almost every cage contains 2 or more animals so that they will have a playmate and not get lonely. Larger animals, such as pigs, are housed separately but have radios and TVs playing in their rooms so that there is always noise for them and they can still feel like there is something going on and can still feel like they are in a social environment. Dr. Steve Niemi is the Director for the Center of Comparative Medicine at the MA General Hospital. Being a veterinarian for the lab animals that are used in research at the hospital, he has a very in-depth knowledge of the workings and procedures that go on within the facility. Niemi told us that there have been changes going in the way animals are being housed in research facilities. It has been determined that animals that are social species, especially primates, sheep, bunnies, etc. will now be housed in larger groups so that they will have more of an interaction with other animals and have a social society. Changes to housing animals in this fashion have been occurring all over the United States, and most European countries have already switched to this method. Every species also has their own specific set of ty0es of toys to fill their cages and make sure they are not barren. Most of the time, the toys given are something that would stimulate natural activities of the animals. Rats get the pleasure of having chew-bones to play with and lots of bedding to dig and tunnel through. Mice were given cotton squares that they can rip up and make bedding out of, and sometimes were given paper towel/toilet paper roles to run through, chew on, and climb on top of. They also have different types of housing or blocks that could be put in the cages so that the mice could hide themselves and feel safe. Bunnies and pigs have their own assortment of balls and weights to play with, and chinchillas are given hay cubes to chew on and play with, which are also helpful for their teeth and diet. Animals in these facilities also do not “languish in pain” as so thought by PETA. Because I want to be a veterinarian, along with working with the husbandry staff taking care of animals during my internship, I was also able to go around with the veterinarians and vet techs and see how they take care of sick animals and assess the progressions of their diseases. Animals with tumors were looked at daily, and if

the tumors seemed to be too large, the veterinarian would order the investigator to humanely euthanize the animal so it did not prolong an uncomfortable life longer than necessary. Animals that had scratches or bite marks from some fighting that went on in a cage would be separated and given some topical treatments to heal the wounds if necessary. Animals would not be allowed to linger in pain. PETA also states that “every year, millions of animals are poisoned and killed in barbaric tests that were crudely developed,” (Product Testing: Toxic & Tragic). These tests that are created for animal testing actually have to be very precise and accurate and have a lot of detail in the procedures that will take place before the test will be passed. During his presentation, Dr. Steve Niemi also told us about how much work it takes to get a research idea passed by the facility’s committee. Every aspect of the proposal is checked, and the committee will send the proposal back for revisions, multiple times if necessary, until the proposed experiment seems legitimate. The committee follows the Three R’s when assessing these proposed tests, and so it is quite clear the tests are not crudely developed. The Three R’s are three goals that have become to define the modern search for alternatives to animal experimentation as well as a way to make sure animals that are used cannot be mistreated. Created by British zoologist William M. S. Russell and microbiologist Rex L. Burch and published in their book entitled The Principles of Humane Experimental Technique, the Three R’s which are reduction, refinement, and replacement, lay out goals that conscientious researchers should strive to achieve. Defined by Andrew N. Rowan, director of the Tufts University Center for Animals and Public Policy, the Three R’s stand for “replacement of animals by in vitro, or test-tube, methods; reduction of their numbers by means of statistical techniques; and refinement of the experiment so as to cause less suffering,” (89). Replacement is the main goal of the committee, in which the committee questions why the researcher cannot use things such as computer simulations or in-vitro experiments for their testing so they do not have to use so many live animals. If that is not possible for the study that is to be conducted, such as for experiments involving how a drug for one organ effects other organs throughout the body, the number of animals must be reduced down to the smallest amount possible “without sacrificing the statistical validity of the results,” (“Research Animals”). Once the least number of animals is determined, the care practices are required to reduce the amount of suffering and distress an animal must go through by determining if more pain medications should be given either before or after a surgery or other traumatic event, and how investigators are to act if an animal seems to still be suffering after following their protocol. Facilities that use certain species of live laboratory animals for research “must abide by laws and policies governing their use,” (“Research Animals”). The main regulation of animal testing is done by the Animal Welfare Act (AWA), passed in May 2002 as part of federal regulations and enforced by the Animal Care unit of the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. The law covers the “regulations [that] govern the housing and care of the animals and include licensing, registration, veterinary, and record-keeping requirements,” as well as includes that “covered facilities must register with the USDA,” (Research Animals”). However, the AWA does not require laboratory facilities to count the number of mice, rats, birds, and cold-blooded animals in their count of animals used in research projects. In 2007, there were just over 1 million animals AWA-registered animals used in live research (“Research Animals”), and it has been said that about 85%-90% of animals used in research are small rodents like mice and rats, which are not included in this total. According to this act, a veterinarian is required to provide adequate veterinary care to the animals. Also, institutional animal care and use committees (IACUC) are “responsible for reviewing a research facility’s animal use program and inspecting the facilities in which animals are housed and studied. These

evaluations must be done at least once every six months,” (“Research Animals”). IACUC members are interested in a number of things happening within the facilities. According to Steven J. Schapiro, Associate Professor of Comparative Medicine at the Michale E. Keeling Center for Comparative Medicine and Research of The University of Texas M.D, the main interest of IACUC members would be “(1) how animals are prepared for residence in the institutional animal care facilities, (2) the associated program of attendant animal care, and (3) how animals are prepared for proposed experimentation,” (“Preparation of Animals”). If animals were actually abused or not taken care of correctly in animal facilities, as is said by some organizations, then the IACUC would find these problems and correct them. Proposed animal experiments must meet certain criteria, and facilities that do not follow the laws can be fined, shut down, or have all of their public funding taken away. There are other laws and regulations passed by the government that control animal testing within research facilities such as the Health Research Extension Act and the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. The Health Research Extension Act, which requires certain facilities to follow an animal welfare policy as well as “follow the recommendations given in the Public Health Service’s Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (1996) regarding housing, cleanliness, husbandry, veterinary care, and use of measures to alleviate pain and distress,” (“Research Animals”). These recommendations are related to the AWA’s recommendations, but also apply to all vertebrates that are not covered in the AWA like mice and rats. The Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act states that “drugs must receive FDA approval before they can be sold in the United States,” and even though the FDA does not specify the tests that must be done, “the agency does not allow human testing to occur if animal safety testing is considered inadequate or incomplete,” (“Research Animals”). These two laws provide more guidelines for research facilities to follow so that animals cannot be mistreated in the laboratories and guarantee they are very well taken care of. There are also other forms of regulation that affect laboratory animals. “The use of animals allows scientists to do certain activities—such as deliberately exposing animals to health risks and observing the course of disease—that most people agree would be wrong to do to human beings,” (“Animal Experimentation”). Trying to rid society of animal testing would only bring more harm in the future to human health. Just as was stated in the Animal Experimentation article, animals are a way scientists can “look into certain genes and follow the disease pattern of the individual must faster than that of a human.” Deliberately exposing humans to a certain disease would most likely not be anyone’s top priority, nor would many people find that very ethical either, but in order to understand the diseases that occur in our society today and potentially find a cure for them, individuals must become infected. Once there are infected individuals, drugs must be tested on these individuals in order to find a cure for the disease. Therefore, we must either infect and test on humans, or on animals. New vaccines created to potentially stop a deadly disease can be deadly themselves in the first stages of creation. So who shall we test these potentially dangerous drugs on, you? your children? or a couple of lab rats? An example to show why animals are most necessary in new drug and vaccine design would be the development of the polio vaccine in the 1950s. “Many candidate vaccines had earlier been tried and had failed. From those earlier vaccines some healthy children had actually contracted polio. That could not be allowed to happen again. To test the new vaccine before its administration to humans, animal subjects were absolutely essential,” (“Animal Experimentation is Necessary”). Without the use of animals in this experiment, even more healthy children could have contracted polio and died from the disease or by the new vaccines. Experiments using animals are not merely helpful, but they remain a necessary condition for the most critical advances in protecting human health.

Another example of how animal testing and research is beneficial to human health is the experimentation currently taking place to try and find a cure for HIV. “HIV is exceptionally good at changing its structure and evading destruction,” and so to account for this, “researchers [must] therefore … use animals to help them test the efficacy of drugs and vaccines, and to ensure these products are safe,” before being used on humans, (“HIV Drugs, Vaccines and Animal Testing”). The main reason HIV testing is done on animals is for safety and efficacy trials. Without animals, there would be no way to fully know how safe and effective a drug is, and giving that drug to a human could potentially kill them. Animals are needed to avoid this problem, and after numerous tests have been conducted, it is likely that the drugs produced will be very advanced medicine and will help benefit the entire human population as a whole. Without the use of animals in experimentation, there is no way we would be as medically advanced as we are today, nor will we become more advanced without the use of animals in further experiments. Laws passed have changed the way animals are housed in lab animal facilities, how they are taken care of in the facilities, and do not allow these animals to suffer, as so thought by so many people. They are treated exceptionally well, and using them for testing will provide vital information for the benefit of human health and medicine in the future, without the use of human testing in the process.

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"Animals Used for Experimentation." People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA): The Animal Rights Organization. PETA. Web. 08 Nov. 2011. <http://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-experimentation/default2.aspx>.

Cohen, Carl, and Tom Regan. The Animal Rights Debate. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2011. Opposing Views. Web. 8 Nov. 2011. <http://http://ic.galegroup.com/ic/ovic/Viewpoints DetailsPage/ViewpointsDetailsWindow?displayGroupName=Viewpoints&disableHighlighting=true&prodId=OVIC&action=e&windowstate=normal&catId=&documentId=GALE%7CEJ3010344221&mode=view>.

Niemi, Steve. Small and Exotic Animal Club (SEAC) General Meeting. Penn State, State College. 30 Nov.

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Challenges for the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC)." Institute for Laboratory Animal Research Journal 47.4 (2006).Institute for Laboratory Animal Research Journal. ILAR Journal. Web. 8 Nov. 2011. <http://delsold.nas.edu/ilar_n/ilarjournal/ online_issues.shtml>.