Every day, an animal is harmed cruelly and unjustly, and it happens even more in the world of animal testing. People are unaware of the harm and dangers that testing inflicts on animals and our environment. Animals are used for inhumane practices just for our gain and public demand. Many products also tend to say ‘cruelty-free’ and vegan but how many of these products are being honest? One of the first tests done on animals was done in 500 B.C. by Aristotle and Erasistratus who discovered that animals of different species have corporal differences. This helped people to understand animals and their structures better. With this research people began to upgrade the ways that the experiments were conducted. Later in 1938, chemicals were required to be tested on animals before they could be sold due to an incident with thalidomide in the late 1950s that led to 10,000 children being born with deformities after their pregnant mothers took the drug.
Regardless, people continue to support animal testing due to past mistakes made. One reason is that rats usually live up to two to three years, so they are easy to test on. This makes the short existence of the rat very painful.
The Animal Welfare Act was later introduced with the purpose of protecting warm-blooded animals bred for research. “This includes zoos, circuses, research labs, hospitals, businesses, federal agencies, dealers, breeders, etc,” according to the National Library of Medicine. Animals excluded from this list are not seen as important compared to animals such as dogs or cats. But they are just as important.
Some labs use the same animals for similar experiments, and if they are bred, the offspring can end up with defects due to the parents being used in these tests. Many of these animals are killed after the experiments, but some have been saved by organizations who help animals out of the research facility labs.
Some films and books have talked about animal testing, one being “Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde,” which talks about how the main character Elle Woods is on a mission to save her pet dog, Bruiser’s, mother from a cosmetic testing facility. This allowed those that watched the movie to see how the reality of animal testing is a real thing and can affect people as well. But many think otherwise.
Some people think it should be done regardless of how animals are treated because they believe that it has health benefits for humans. But other people say it should not because the rights of animals are violated, and they do not get the diseases naturally, one example being major heart diseases. For those who want to support products that are against animal testing, some products have labels on them, including e.l.f, Dial, Dove, and NYX. Animal testing should not be done unless restrictions are made to ensure the animal is disposed of properly so that, for future purposes, the other animals in the ecosystem will not have to struggle with health problems introduced by humans.
