Say No to Animal Testing

Imagine being locked up in a tiny cage with no room for movement trapped, restricted, enclosed, with no way of ever escaping. Having absolutely no control of any aspect of your life and most of all, having not even the slightest bit of freedom. Withstanding the most horrendous, gruesome, and utterly disgusting torture, occasionally having your hair shaved off or unknown substances rubbed into your skin, completely preventing the growth of new hair or even worse, it burning so severely to the point where your skin bleeds. These are only a few of the horrifying things that animals experience when being tested. Animal testing is extremely cruel and also unnecessary as most tests aren’t actually precise, recurrently failing as humans and animals react very differently. Furthermore, it is a huge waste of money when resources could be spent in more efficient ways.

To begin with, animal testing is exceptionally cruel and inhumane as animals are always harmed in the process. They are treated unfairly and the conditions in which they live in are absolutely horrendous. Many different animal species are tested on around the globe, especially mice, rats, rabbits, birds, cats, dogs, and monkeys. Animals are being objectified, treated as though they don’t have a heartbeat. In the eyes of big businesses and corporations, animals are completely worthless. They are being burned, shocked, poisoned, starved, drowned, drugged and much worse. In addition with having their hair shaved off and extensively bleeding all over their bodies, animals are purposely blinded with unfamiliar liquids forced into their eyes.

They are also infected with harmful diseases which would never have affected them if it weren’t for these unthinkable conditions. Moreover, animals are force-fed dangerous chemicals. They are put through endless amounts of surgeries, tortured with the pain of their spines being crushed, and once all of this is done, thrown back into their cages without any form of medication or painkiller. These poor, innocent animals live in constant fear and anxiety. Each year, more than 100 million animals are killed due to animal testing.

An equally important factor is that animal testing is completely unnecessary as animals and humans and humans react very differently from each other. Therefore, tests won’t be accurate and majority of the time, fail. Approximately 95% of all drugs and products that are shown to be safe and effective in animal tests prove to fail in human tests because they are either dangerous or simply do not work. This method of testing is pointless because although animals and humans are similar in some ways, they are also particularly different in others.

Animals do not acquire the same diseases as humans such as major types of heart disease, various types of cancer, HIV, Parkinson’s disease and more. To supposedly make the tests more “accurate”, signs of these diseases are artificially generated in animals in laboratories in an attempt to replicate the human disease in the animal.

However, such experiments depreciate the complexity and individuality of human conditions which are effected by a range of variables such as genetics and personal experiences. Due to this, tests fail and increase the amount of inaccurate tests.

 Not only is animal testing cruel and unnecessary, it is also extremely wasteful of money and resources which could be spent in more effective ways, for instance improving the products being tested and making it correctly in the first place.  

An unexplainable amount of money is wasted on animal testing each year, The National Institutes of Health spending approximately 16 billion dollars annually on animal testing. That is 16 billion dollars down the drain! Furthermore, all the money being used on animal testing is supplied by tax payers. Would you want your money being spent on torturing animals? I know I wouldn’t. This money could be used elsewhere in much more efficient ways instead of wasting it on impractical and unrealistic experiments. Over 6 million animals suffer from animal testing every single year and for what? A cool, new lipstick, or maybe a beautiful blush or perhaps even a lovely, scented shampoo.

Animal testing must be banned. Opulence should not come from oppression.

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