Andrew is a post-doctoral researcher in North Carolina focused on population and conservation genetics in hydrothermal vent communities.
Image from HumaneSociety.org
I am, in general, a supporter of animal rights. Animal abuse sickens me, and I really believe Ghandi’s famous quote that “you can judge a society by how it treats its weakest members”. That said, while it’s disturbing to see a rabbit which has gone blind from exposure to a potential new shampoo, I’d rather have a rabbit go blind than a human child. More importantly, while it is troubling to infect a chimpanzee with a disease in order to study how to cure that disease, such research unquestionably saves human lives. That’s why I was surprised to learn about the Great Ape Protection Act.
This proposed law will ban all invasive medical tests on great apes. While some animal rights groups are cheering, medical researchers are concerned. There are many human diseases that are presently being studied in laboratory animals, including AIDS and malaria, and banning this research would set the search for a cure back immeasurably. More troubling is the effect that an ape research ban would have on Hepatitis C studies.
According to the CDC, 3.2 million Americans suffer from Hepatitis C. Though some diseases can be tested in other ways, chimpanzees are the primary model system for Hep C, (other model systems, such as mice, are very early in development) which means that banning great ape research is basically equivalent to saying that scientists aren’t allowed to cure Hep C for a long time.
A comparison between co-sponsors of the Great Ape Protection Act and the Viral Hepatitis and Liver Cancer Control and Prevention Act of 2009 (which calls for increased Hep C vaccine research) shows that 16 congressman are simultaneously saying “You have to find a cure for Hepatitis C very quickly” and “You aren’t allowed to use the only functional model system to develop a cure for Hepatitis C”. All are Democrats. These represent only co-sponsors. It is likely that more people would be revealed as hypocrites if every member of congress actually voted on this bill- and many more can be revealed now by examining co-sponsors of other hepatitis C legislation.
Arguments made for the law imply that great ape research is the Wild West, and that mad scientists torture chimpanzees for their sociopathic pleasure. This is simply not the case. As an open letter to Congress signed by numerous scientific organizations states, “scientists take research using non-human primates extremely seriously, and multiple protections exist in law and through accreditation to ensure these animals are well-treated and used with respect.”
Here are some other facts about this proposed law.
-It not only bans the use of apes to find cures to deadly human diseases, but also the use of apes to find cures to deadly ape diseases. You can bet that many more gorillas will die from this strain of malaria than would die from research to cure it. The same is true of the chimpanzee strain of ebola.
-The phrasing of the law includes gibbons as great apes. This is news to primate biologists who have long considered them a separate group.
Though there are many excellent scientific organizations that oppose this law, I want to refer you specifically to the statement put out by the American Academy for the Advancement of Science, one of the most prestigious scientific societies in the world.
I know that we have many animal rights activists among our readers, and I invite you (as always) to join in the discussion. However, I fervently believe that If the Great Ape Protection Act becomes law, it will be terrible news for humans as well as apes. Animal rights are extremely important, but human lives are more important.
Also, while this discussion is primarily about the ethics of saving human lives through research, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Dr. Free Ride’s recent post about how the lives of human researchers are threatened more directly by animal rights activists, PZ Myers recent list of overzealous animal rights activists, and Orac’s description of a frightening new tactic used by some of them. Whatever our views are on the ethics of animal research, surely we can all agree that threatening researchers and their children is a completely unacceptable way of accomplishing goals… right?
Do you think that it is acceptable to protect animal rights at the expense of human lives?
Do you think that saving human lives justifies experimenting on animals?
Are rules that protect animals in laboratory studies good enough the way they are? Are they too powerful already?
~WhySharksMatter
Okay, I totally feel like a creeper commenting on a post right after it’s put up.
However, you nicked a nerve of something I’ve been kind of steaming about lately- politicians making laws on issues closely tied to science with no regard for science.
Just last week, the WI State Senate voted and approved a bill that would ban Salvia divinorum, an herb that, when smoked, causes very short term, powerful hallucinogenic effects. Studies about the short term effects of it have just shown that when you’re on it, you are in a really odd place for about 3 minutes. There have been no long-term studies. In addition, I don’t think there have been any salvia-related deaths. Ever. Granted, hallucinogens usually have negative side effects, but I’ve never heard of a salvia related death.
Anyways, on topic:
It really sounds just like the above bill. Unscientific, illogical (especially the part about banning great ape use for great ape disease research!) and really detrimental to progress.
I do have a question, though.
Is there any research going on in tissue synthesis? It would follow the three Rs of animal research and take up much less space (and presumably time, resources and eventually, money) and it might be possible to obtain similar results.
Also, would the Great Apes Protection Act protect synthesized Great Ape tissues? The writers of the bill seemed to think gibbons were apes, maybe they think tissues are species?
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Come now, Sam. You’re a creeper for a lot of reasons, but not because you comment right after a post is put up.
I’m not sure about tissue synthesis. If such research is occurring at all, we’re probably years away at least from it being functional. Chimpanzee models work now.
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I’ll look up papers tomorrow when I’m doing research for a lab report I’ll be writing (I don’t have access to Web of Knowledge unless I’m on campus) and pass any good ones along.
And I’m still grouchy about salvia. I’ll look that up, too.
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Having needed animal ethics approval for all my studies I realise what a pain it is to get it but I would never say that it is too tough.
My main gripe is from a different perspective. Why do apes have more right to not be experimented on than other animals such as fish or rabbits. Surly pain is pain! It is pretty biased to save those that most resemble ourselves I think.
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Sam, tissue cultures certainly have their place in research, though, as I understand, liver tissue is relatively difficult to maintain outside the body. Even if the difficulties of growing Petri-dish livers are overcome (as is being worked on here: link to hhmi.org), it would not be an alternative to animal studies so much as it would be an augmentation. They can’t tell us how drugs effect a system in its entirety. You can’t take the blood pressure of a cell culture. So as the three R’s go, tissue cultures are more of a “reduce” than a “replace”–we still need chimps.
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I understand about using animals for disease research, what I don’t understand is using them for cosmetics and so on like that. I think that we have come far enough that cosmetics should not need to be tested as they all contain pretty much the same ingredients.
I don’t like to see animals suffering, but i also know that we do need to have ways to find cures and medicines for diseases.
Tough call.
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Point 1. We haven’t been “put” anywhere, that’s not how evolution works. We’ve evolved to function well in a given environment. The short answer is nature doesn’t care if you’re kind or cruel. All morality is a human construct and all ethical frameworks are a priori anthropocentric.
Point 2. A human life is more valuable to us than an animal life because our ethical framework is necessarily anthropocentric. I love when people throw out “Humans are the only species destroying the world!” It’s an absurd sentiment. All species are surviving for their own self interest. The real flip side to that is the Humans are the only species working to save and protect the environment. We are the only species capable of saving the environment. Humans are also one of the very few species that show altruism towards ‘other’ species without any clear benefit to us, does that make us more valuable?
Point 3. Nature doesn’t “decide” anything. I’m not sure you understand how nature “works” at all. We seem to be very successful at curing disease. The average life expectancy in developed nations has tripled in the last century and violent deaths have plummeted. Overpopulation is a real problem but not one that your proposal has any hope of solving. Here’s a clue – the countries with the lowest birthrates also have the highest standards of medical care. You want to fix overpopulation? make sure everyone has access to health care, education, birth control, and a long enough life-span that they care what happens to the next 5 generations.
Point 4. see above. You want to solve overpopulation invest in health, education, and birth control. There’s a reason the countries with the lowest life expectancies also have the highest birthrates.
I think you don’t really understand what’s happening in this world and what the consequences are. “People are bad and we should let them all die” is a weak ethical and philosophical framework to start from.
So what?
It’s wrong to use animals for research just because we think we’re more valuable than them, so lets use certain people for research because we’re more valuable than them? Really? That’s what you decided to close with? Pathetic.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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i forgot to ask one question, when i did my thesis for my honour of zoology my subject was antibacterial defences in sharks, i was provided with 18 young sharks i had to kill at the end of the experiment (i was kindda trapped in it and didn’t know the sharks were going to be killed till the last minute when it was too late to back of) but i made sure they didn’t suffer, they were put to sleep in their tank, i was even holding them, so do you think this is ok to use and kill sharks for science?
after all you seem to say it is ok to use animals if we learn from them, so learning about antibacterial defences in shark might be beneficial to humans in some way so i take that as you agree killing sharks is ok, right?
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That’s kind of comparing apples to oranges, and it’s not really what this post is about, but I’ll answer it.
I think in some circumstances, killing sharks for the purposes of research is acceptable (my research involves nonlethal, minimally invasive sampling). The reasons why killing sharks for research would be wrong in my eyes are:
1) The shark species in question is endangered or threatened
2) The information that those researchers are seeking can be gained through non-lethal means
3) The animal suffers needlessly
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Which is exactly why you get approval from animal review boards before you get to do work on vertebrates and have to prove that there are no alternatives to the experiment first.
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Indeed it is. Almost as if there are already strong rules governing humane treatment of laboratory animals.
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The very reasons that it is illegal to experiment on humans are same reasons that it should be illegal to experiment on animals — the right to its own life, its ability to suffer are the same for both human and nonhuman animals.
If animal experimentation could cure every human disease and disability (and obviously it can’t), what will have been gained? The world would still be at war, its oceans and air polluted, with the human population still largely unhealthy due to poor lifestyle choices — over-fed, doped -up, under-exercised. How is science and its prestigious scientific societies successfully addressing these problems?
Want to improve the health of humans and the environment? Save more lives than would ever be possible by animal experimentation? End the exploitation of animals. It’s a failed experiment. Adopt a vegan lifestyle.
It’s a simple existential choice: either continue living in a world where animals suffer and die needlessly to meet our needs and whims, or choose to create and live in a world where they do not.
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First off, it’s not illegal to experiment on humans, every new drug and therapy has to go through clinical trials before being released to the market.
I love this thought because it shows exactly where you’re coming from. The human race is not “largely unhealthy because of poor lifestyle choice”, a very small portion of the world is over-fed, doped-up, and under-exercised” and you know what? They also have the highest quality of life in the world. The rest of the world is just trying to survive.
While veganism is a strong and valid moral and ethical framework, it is not a solution to any of those problems. It doesn’t improve the health of you or the environment any more than being conscious of your diet and choosing food from sustainable sources does. It certainly doesn’t save more lives than animal experimentation has. It’s a solid personal choice, not a global solution. What you want is 100% global compliance with a vegan lifestyle.
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Interesting debate! There are some of your replies that are at least arguable.
“First off, it’s not illegal to experiment on humans, every new drug and therapy has to go through clinical trials before being released to the market.”
Yes, but the laws for experimenting on humans are much more stringent than the laws for experimenting on animals.
“While veganism is a strong and valid moral and ethical framework, it is not a solution to any of those problems.”
There are an increasing number of scientific studies that show that vegan and vegetarian diets are more healthy, and that these diets increase longevity in humans:
link to usatoday.com
Also, such diets are probably the greatest single way for an individual to reduce one’s carbon footprint, which is in line with the need to take action against anthropogenic global climate change, another environmental problem supported by a strong scientific consensus.
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I totally support your vegan lifestyle, and I think the US culture has many improvements to make regarding the way we treat our environment. However, humans are the top of the food chain, so we need to accept the fact that it is okay for animals to die because of us; it is part of the natural cycle of life.
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I have mixed feelings about the ape testing and animal testing in general. I love animals. I consider myself an animal activist. I’m a vegan. I do buy all my cosmetic type products and cleaning products that say they have not been tested on animals. But I don’t think they should stop testing on animals. I would love for science to advance to a point that animal testing was no longer needed. My father has Hep C from a blood transfusion he recieved in the Vietnam War. I want him to be around for a LONG time. If it means testing on animals to keep him here; I’m okay with that.
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And that’s what it really comes done to, minimize suffering as much as possible. Look for alternatives. But where no alternatives exist, we use animal testing.
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How did the animal testing research done on Thalidomide turn out? Let the scientists here please list some of the biggest failures of animal research — just to keep the discussion unbiased. Weigh both the pros and cons.
Obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer all have significant lifestyle components — often controllable or preventable by lifestyle changes. Prevention should always be preferred over cure. These diseases are more common in developed nations, and as development is the direction the world is headed (at least until its timely demise), it’s better to take note and address their prevention first and foremost.
Again, an easy calculation for the scientists here, but the world cannot feed its entire population a sustainable meat-centered diet let alone a hormone-free, grain-fed one. Undeveloped countries are now having their own environments destroyed in an unscientific attempt to feed the “over-fed, doped -up, under-exercised” of the developed nations — which is referred to above as “highest quality of life in the world.” That’s a highly subjective and unscientific statement. No, the whole world doesn’t want to be like “us”.
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“Quality of Life” is not a subjective nor unscientific term – it refers to the Human Development Index and is a measure of life expectancy, education, and gross domestic product.
Of course there have been some tremendous medical tragedies, just as there have been environmental disasters in the animal rights movement. So what? You’re throwing up a strawman because you’re unwilling to honestly enter the debate. The eradication of small pox alone vastly overshadows the many failures in medicine. You honestly think we should throw out an incredibly effective system just because it’s not 100% perfect?
The world can’t feed itself on a strictly non-meat system either. Please don’t conflate ‘eating meat’ with supporting the massive industrial farming that happens in the US. There are plenty of conscientious carnivores out there opposed to factory farming.
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This blog post presumes that chimpanzee research is scientifically valid and relevant to and predictive of human biology and disease – and therein lays the major flaw. When one looks at the evidence, it is apparent that chimpanzee research, far from “unquestionably saving human lives”, produces data that confound our knowledge of human diseases and our search for treatments and cures. In contrast to unsubstantiated claims from advocates of chimpanzee research, peer-reviewed and comprehensive analyses have revealed:
• Half of all this “crucial” chimpanzee research has never been cited in subsequent scientific publications, such is its lack of importance (according to a citation analysis of 95 randomly selected chimpanzee papers). Less than 15% of these chimpanzee publications were cited with a direct human medical context, and crucially the cited chimpanzee studies did not contribute to the outcome of the citing papers reporting an advance in human clinical practice.
• More than 85 HIV vaccines (of many different types) have been tested in around 200 human trials. None works in people, despite most of the vaccines and vaccine types having exhibited prophylactic and/or therapeutic efficacy in prior chimpanzee experiments. This lack of predictability led to a decline in HIV/AIDS-related chimpanzee studies of 90% from 1998 to 2005 – hardly a resounding endorsement of an indispensable model.
• Chimps have barely been used to research one of mankind’s biggest killers, cancer. This is because chimpanzee tumors are rare, and are biologically very different to human tumors (carcinogenicity, cell growth, apoptosis, metastasis etc.) Further, chimpanzees are not necessary in preclinical testing of monoclonal antibody therapies for cancer treatment.
• The blog post is dismissive of the contribution of non-chimpanzee studies of hepatitis C (epidemiology; clinical studies; human-specific in vitro systems such as primary culture, molecular clones, replicons, virus-like particles/pseudoparticles and full life-cycle cellular clones) to the advancement of our knowledge of it, and the foundation this has created on which to build further research towards a treatment/cure. Also, the claimed necessity of chimpanzee contributions in historical research is greatly exaggerated. In short, chimpanzees are not needed for superior and effective hepatitis C research now and in the future.
These points address most of the claims in the blog post.
It is imperative to gauge the cost/benefit balance of any animal research. We are now discovering that the postulated benefits of chimpanzee research are minimal/non-existent, while the costs, both ethical costs to the chimpanzees (complex post-traumatic stress disorders, self-harm & other serious psychological problems) and financial costs to the taxpayer, are substantial. We know that around 80% of the 1000 or so chimpanzees in U.S. labs are being “warehoused” at great expense, and aren’t even in active research protocols: and the U.S. is the only country in the world in which any significant invasive chimpanzee research occurs, as many countries have banned or at least severely limited it. These facts alone betray claims of the essential nature of chimpanzee experimentation for treating human diseases. And, as scientists are ultimately accountable to the public that funds their research, it is worth highlighting that twice as many Americans support a ban on chimpanzee research as oppose one. It is time for cruel and useless chimpanzee research in the U.S. to be consigned to history, as it has been all over the rest of the world. Not only the chimpanzees will benefit, but also the funds freed up for superior, more effective human-specific research will lead to greater and quicker scientific and medical advancement.
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“Half of all this “crucial” chimpanzee research has never been cited in subsequent scientific publications,”
Assuming those statistics are valid, that still means that half of it is cited in future publications. Sure, research doesn’t always generate the exact results we want…but not doing research means you will never generate results.
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For heaven’s sake, Mr. Bailey, what utopian world do you live in? At least half of ALL scientific publications are never cited, except by their own authors. So what? You don’t know whether it’s going to be important until you do it.
Been there, done that, as has our host. (To whose short message I am replying because it bears directly on the point I am making.)
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“superior, more effective human-specific research will lead to greater and quicker scientific and medical advancement.”
I assume you have some sort of evidence that this is the case? You wouldn’t just be throwing around buzzwords that make your cause sound good without basing them on facts?
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Jarrod,
Please don’t interpret this as anything other than academic curiosity and is no way meant to be dismissive, but, other than the PTSD papers, do you have any primary sources that weren’t produced by you?
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“superior, more effective human-specific research will lead to greater and quicker scientific and medical advancement.”
Um… the whole reason great apes are used is to be more “human-specific” than mice or other models without using people.
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“This blog post presumes that chimpanzee research is scientifically valid and relevant to and predictive of human biology and disease”
I will freely admit that I assumed that when writing the post- because it’s completely true. Doctors and medical researchers say it’s the case.
I’m still not sure what your point is about citation rate. As I understand it, considerably less than half of global warming publications are ever cited again. By your logic, are you saying that global warming isn’t happening?
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please forgive the fact that I have not read the other comments — so this might already have been addressed, but
I can’t help note what may be a linguistic issue — David, do you distinguish between animal “rights” and animal “welfare”? This is an important distinction.
Humans are the only moral animal, all others are amoral — for example, if I eat David while he is still alive and kicking, you would rightly consider me a “monster”. However, if an orca eats a trainer, the orca is just doing what orcas do and has no concept of right vs wrong. I think a sound reasoning and philosophical/ethical argument leads one to conclude that animals do not have “rights” per say.
Note: I do very strongly believe that we [humans] should do everything we can to protect and promote animal “welfare”
BTW: I heard about a new book that may be of interest to you and your blog readers:
Amazon.com: A Rat Is a Pig Is a Dog Is a Boy: The Human Cost of the Animal Rights Movement (9781594033469): Wesley J. Smith: Books link to ow.ly
Enjoy the rest of your discussion/commenting — I’ve got to get back to work. I love your blog.
Peace — Ed
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That’s a very important and often overlook distinction.
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This is a can of worms. The problem is that we simply do not know if the vast majority of animals have a moral system or not. Orcas DO NOT eat humans. In captivity, we have no evidence that they do anything other than play too rough. Attacks on humans by wild orcas are so rare as to be virtually non-existant, and are almost certainly examples of an accident on the part of the whale of confusing humans with prey. Many of the very rare examples of intraspecific altruism have been exhibited by cetaceans, not only with many examples of dolphins saving human lives, but with a recent and fascinating account of humpback whales altruistically saving seals from orcas:
link to naturalhistorymag.com
There is evidence from the long-term communication dialogs with Koko the lowland gorilla that gorillas, at least, have a moral compass. (See the Gorilla Society at Gorilla.org, the lifetime work of Dr. Penny Patterson).
Since this is a science blog, I feel it necessary to point out that conclusively calling all animals “amoral” has not been supported by any evidence other than assumption, and there are some tantalizing and well-documented indications that, at least in some animals, the opposite may be true.
My own varied and extensive experience with animals leads me to believe that some animals most definitely will place an amazing amount of trust in specific human individuals.
I have not read the book that is mentioned, but we do not compare human lives to “cost,” because we assume that a human life is not measurable in those terms (to do so would be considered amoral), yet we make this comparison all the time with animals. Upon what logic is this dichotomy based? As a matter of fact, upon what logical, scientific or moral principle is placing a human life ahead of the life of every other living thing on the planet earth based? This assumption is certainly not based on science. If we wanted to do millions of creatures and even species a real favor at this point, we could probably not do much better than banning humans from the planet earth, from the viewpoint of non-human life.
That may be the weakest link in this whole argument.
Dr. Albert Schweitzer once said: “A man is truly ethical only when he obeys the compulsion to help all life which he is able to assist, and shrinks from injuring anything that lives.” And that is a statement from a medical doctor.
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I worked for seven years at a primate research facility and co-authored publications that involved primate use. That experience opened my eyes and drove me to advocate for desperately needed changes.
I too believed that is was a choice between child and chimpanzee at the start of my career. But the fact is—ending chimpanzee research could very well help the child and continuing to waste time and money on chimpanzee research will prevent progress. The United States is the only remaining country that continues the large-scale use of chimpanzees for invasive research and testing.
The Great Ape Protection Act would phase out invasive research on great apes and retire the 500 government-owned chimpanzees to sanctuary. There are many reasons to support GAPA, but the four main ones are:
1. Chimpanzee research is a scientific failure and there are alternatives: The government has strongly signaled that the chimpanzee model isn’t as valuable as some claim. The National Center for Research Resources ended breeding of government-owned chimpanzees in 1995 and there has been a 50 percent decline in the number government grants involving invasive chimpanzee research in the past decade and many laboratories have shut down.
There are exaggerated claims of effectiveness about hepatitis C studies using chimpanzees (seehttp://www.humanesociety.org/news/press_releases/2009/12/hepatitis_c_research_using_chimps_121509.html). There are proven effective alternatives to chimpanzee use for hepatitis C and other areas of research.
2. Keeping chimpanzees in laboratories wastes taxpayer dollars: Approximately 80-90% of the estimated 1000 chimpanzees currently warehoused in US laboratories cost taxpayers approximately $25 million per year. The government bred hundreds of chimpanzees in the 1980’s for HIV research but the model was a failure and the government ended up with a surplus.
3. There are serious ethical concerns: Chimpanzees are self-aware, make tools, lead complex social lives and can live 60 years. The Humane Society of the United States conducted an undercover investigation last year at the New Iberia Research Center in LA., the world’s largest chimp research facility, and revealed gross mistreatment of the primates at that facility (see link to humanesociety.org)
4. The public supports the goals of GAPA: 90% of Americans believe it is unacceptable to confine chimpanzees in standard cages (5 ft x 5 ft x 7 ft) and 54% believe that it is unacceptable for chimpanzees to “undergo research which causes them to suffer for human benefit.”
Declarations about invasive great ape research being important to wild populations are far out of line with reality. I am unaware of any invasive study in a laboratory today that seeks to solely help wild chimpanzees. As a matter of fact, using chimpanzees in invasive research undermines conservation of this endangered species.
It is time for the US to catch up with the rest of the world in ending invasive research on great apes. We urge everyone to support the Great Ape Protection Act. If you are a scientist with a higher degree and want to add your name to a list of over 600 scientists who support ending invasive research on chimpanzees, feel free to contact us at [email protected]
Kathleen Conlee
The Humane Society of the United States
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I tend to be in agreement with you that there is needed change. Most studies can be done with other vertebrates or human cell lines, but for some studies there is a need for primates, and an outright ban will certainly not help medical progress.
I would like to take exception to point 2, simply because it’s irrational rhetoric. Even if we halted all great apes studies in the US, we still have an obligation to care for chimpanzees that were once used in experiments, which means there “wasted dollars” would still have to be spent, unless you propose we euthanize all research animals.
The fact that we’re talking about 1000 animals really puts the scale of things in perspective. If 1001 lives have been saved as a result of this research, would that be a net benefit to society?
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Kathleen’s point number 2 is only irrational if you deny our financial responsibility for taking these animals out of the wild and breeding them for human use in the first place. I would argue that, having done this, we are absolutely responsible for these animals’ lives and well-being. Are you trying to say that, having a surplus of captive chimpanzees, we might as well use them for some research anyway and get our money’s worth? As a taxpayer, if my tax dollars are spent in an unethical way, then I would consider that a waste of my tax dollars, whether research is done or not. If this mistake costs money, then there will be some incentive not to take on morally dubious projects like this in the future. Remember, we took on the responsibility for caring for these animals in an ethical way when we bred them in captivity.
I have read that the research on HIV done with chimpanzees has been considered scientifically invalid because of the subtle differences in the way chimpanzees react to the human HIV virus. As a matter of fact, HIV vaccines have worked on chimpanzees that have been totally ineffective on humans. It is interesting to note that Jane Goodall, who has extensively studied chimpanzees and who has nothing to gain or lose by ending this type of research, does not believe that chimps should be used in such experiments, while the proponents of chimpanzee testing are almost invariably the doctors who run these facilities, and who would lose their well-paying jobs if such testing was prohibited.
Just down the road from me in Bastrop, Texas, there is a chimpanzee medical research facility where they had done a lot of this HIV testing. Not too long ago, two chimpanzees escaped from this facility within a three-month period. The second chimpanzee ended up being very unnecessarily shot dead by the police. The lab was fined for violations of federal codes for maintaining chimpanzees in captivity. No one went to jail, because it was a chimpanzee that was unnecessarily killed.
Chimpanzees share 99% of their coding DNA sequences with humans. There is conjecture that chimpanzees may even have been crossbred with humans in the past. We are very closely related, and scientists believe that interbreeding would be possible. Now, imagine yourself in the position of a chimpanzee undergoing medical experiments. If this bothers you morally, or if you even resist doing that particular “thought experiment,” what does that tell you?
The only defense is that human life is somehow more significant than chimpanzee life; that human suffering is somehow less acceptable than chimpanzee suffering. Is this idea really based on science, or is it based on morals? So, this being an ethical debate, why do you feel that a chimpanzee’s suffering is subordinate to human suffering?
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I want to ask you about a couple of points you raised.
“The public supports the goals of GAPA”.
Sorry to be harsh, but I’m more interested in what medical researchers think is important for medical research than I am in what the average person thinks is important for medical research. Science is not decided by what non-scientists think is best.
“It is time for the US to catch up with the rest of the world in ending invasive research on great apes.”
Again, what difference do the research policies of the rest of the world make? We should do what works best, not what other countries feel is appropriate.
I can’t help but notice that the overwhelming majority of medical breakthroughs occur in the United States. Maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to adapt our medical research policies to those of the rest of the world?
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The key word is “needlessly”. If there is no way to avoid it and it serves an important goal (i.e. curing human diseases), the suffering isn’t needless.
The animals aren’t suffering for the “satisfaction” of humans, it is to save human lives. That’s really not the same thing at all.
“the only effective way to control human population is by disease and that’s exactly why they exist, simple as that!”
Are you really arguing that we shouldn’t research cures for diseases because it is good for the environment when humans die from diseases? Really?
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UK Birth Rate – 10.65 births/1,000 population
France Birth Rate – 12.73 births/1,000 population
China Birth Rate – 13.71 births/1,000 population
India Birth Rate – 22.22 births/1,000 population
Nigeria Birth Rate – 37.23 births/1,000 population
Somalia Birth Rate – 44.12 births/1,000 population
All freely available from http://www.CIA.gov
Number of single mothers just means Brits don’t marry as young (another common occurrence in well-educated countries). Birth control means contraceptives. Your analogy to China is completely irrelevant.
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I presume all those on this blog who have argued that animals should be used in research would agree with the claim that both scientists and animal advocates share a wish not to use animals in research that cause them (the animals) suffering and/or harm. Therefore, we all share that goal. Where we disagree is how fast we can reach the stage where we will no longer be using animals and how much effort (i.e. time and money) should be put into achieving such a goal.
To invest the discussion with some actual facts on animal use, it should be noted that the number of animals used in biomedical laboratories appears to have peaked around 1975 and that the number has fallen by about 50% since then. Where we have data on research productivity, it indicates that, despite the explosion of GM mice in laboratory animal facilities in the past decade and a half, the amount of research data produced per animal continues to climb. I would also refer readers to the NRC Report on Toxicology in the 21st Century. This report, produced by an expert panel convened by the National Research Council, concluded that toxicology should move away from animal use and instead rely on human cell systems and in silico analyses to predict human toxicity and risk. link to nap.edu
Sir Peter Medawar, the Nobel prize winning immunologist and philosopher of science, noted as far back as 1969 that biological science would not forever rely on the use of animals but that, for the moment, only through the use of animals would we one day be able to dispense with their use altogether. He was remarkably prescient. As the biological sciences continue to decrease their reliance on the use of animals, we at The Humane Society of the United States are now proposing that we no longer need to rely on the harmful use of Great Apes to continue to progress biomedical science!
Hot debate. What do you think?
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“both scientists and animal advocates share a wish not to use animals in research that cause them (the animals) suffering and/or harm… Where we disagree is how fast we can reach the stage where we will no longer be using animals”
I’d say that’s a fair assessment of the situation.
Scientists are saying that while we should be actively working on the development of different model systems, we should use the ones we have that work (i.e. laboratory animals) until that time because to simply stop using the best model system we have before a new one is created will cost human lives.
The animal rights crowd seems to be saying that we need to stop using laboratory animals now, before we have another functional model system. The reasoning seems to vary from vague claims that better model systems exist already but aren’t being used…all the way to stating that we shouldn’t do medical research at all because the environment is better off when diseases kill lots of humans.
However, we do all share the same goal of not having to use laboratory animals for medical research eventually.
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I think we’re pretty much on the page with you, Andrew. Eventually as medical models get better we phase out more and more animal research, as is currently happening. Most testing can be done without great apes (as was stated above there’s only 1000 chimps currently in the US for experiments, most of which are warehoused). The question is whether we’re there yet or not.
I’d make the perhaps radical prediction that we’ll see maybe one more generation of research chimps before they’re no longer needed. Beyond any law that could be passed, the expense involved in animal care is what will drive the demand for more effective models.
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Please provide any source that gibbons are currently being used in animal testing. Gibbons are protected in the US under the endangered species act. Why would you assume that we’d support medical test on endangered species when it’s clearly been stated that we don’t support medical testing on endangered species?
So your comments about how many are people being born aren’t about birth rate? Odd.
Human diseases affect humans, so humans are trying to cure them. Why is that a problem?
“i don’t understand why you put this subject on a blog for people to speak about it because obviously you both have your idea on the matter and you are not speaking about it, you are trying to convince people writing on this blog you are right and they are wrong”
In your case, yeah, because we think you’re wrong. Isn’t that exactly what you’re doing?
“this is not speaking openly to me, this is forcing your opinion on other people!”
Because we dragged you out of your house, sat you at a computer, and forced you to read and comment on the blog. Are people only speaking openly if they agree with you?
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“why do people want to find cure to humans disease but not to animals disease then? if we need to cure everything why are disease killing animals not investigated as much?…once again humans are so important they deserve this but not the animals i guess. ”
Lana, you are a human, right? One weird thing about blog conversations is that I can’t actually know that for sure, but I’m assuming that you and I are both human. (Actually, if a chimpanzee was capable of participating in a blog conversation, it might affect my opinion on chimpanzee research)
Assuming that you are a human, I really find it difficult to believe that you think the life of a chimpanzee and the life of a human are morally equivalent. I certainly think that the life of a chimpanzee has value, but the life of a human has a much, much greater value. Why do I think that? Because I’m a human. I’m sure that if chimpanzees were capable of thought on this level (which they are most definitely not), they would think that chimpanzee lives were more important than human lives.
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Fair enough, Gwen. The issue is when people use inaccurate polling (or just make numbers up) to justify “public support” of their position. For example, I find it amazing how the overwhelming majority of the American public supports a public option in the health care reform bill, while, at the same time, the overwhelming majority of the American public opposes a public option in the health care reform bill.
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I am not against animals being used for research. I am a big proponent of animal welfare and the present 3Rsystem of research. reduce # of subjects used, eliminate unnecessary redundancy, and remedy any paid for animals.
What bugs me is that many of the legal meausre related to animal wefare in studies is only aimed at university and government researchers. Private companies (like cosmetics are not subject to the hoop jumping of IACUC). No fair, and more often than not, university researchers are very sympathetic to animal wefare issues.
But to fully disclose – I am not at all comfortable doing invasive research on animals – for human research or even to learn more about the animals…because another important point to be made is that not all animal research is designed to figure out how disease/injury/malady works in animals. I observe animals as the subject of interest, not just as an incubator of a disease.
But these same welfare issues affect me, because all animal research (and researchers) are thrown into the same bag.
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What are you talking about, friend? It was stupid of us to decide to get sick?
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Methinks someone doesn’t quite grasp the concept of a debate. Get over yourself, you won’t be missed.
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Because prisoners are humans?
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Well, for one thing you can’t study developmental effects on someone who’s done developing.
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Here’s an interesting point from the Twitter discussion on this post.
“Ask the experimenters why they experiment on animals and they say, “Because the animals are like us.” …..Ask the experimenters why it’s morally OK to experiment on animals: “Because the animals are not like us.”"
I think that’s a bit of an oversimplification, but it’s an interesting point. Thoughts?
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Could that not be rephrased as “they’re the closest thing to us that’s not us?”
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Actually, that probably was the original phrasing before my Twitter friend changed it. Yeah, I’d say that’s a totally correct assessment of the situation.
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Genetically and legally, yes I would. I don’t think he’s a particularly nice human, and he certainly isn’t a well-adjusted productive member of society. That doesn’t mean that we should perform medical experiments on him. There’s a little thing called the Constitution that governs how we treat prisoners.
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No one is saying that animals have no value and are expendable. We are saying that animal research is the best way (as of right now) to cure several human diseases and save many human lives.
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Actually animals aren’t capable of being “innocent” because anthropocentric legal and moral framework applies a priori to humans exclusively. Animals can’t be ‘moral’ as we understand it because morality is a human construction. Part of our moral framework applies to animal welfare – treating animals with respect, not being unnecessarily cruel, etc. but animals can’t be active participants in that framework.
I.E. a chimpanzee killing the offspring of a less dominant male (which is not uncommon) is not a ‘murderer’ or ‘amoral’, while a human who does the same would be a monster.
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Iana24 is obviously not a parent of an ill child. My daughter has HepC and I have a chronic immune system condition that works a lot like HIV and I am an adamant supporter of protecting animal welfare. I am sickened and confounded by people like Michael Vick and cosmetic companies that continue to use animal research for non-medical things. However, I do believe that fanaticism is always dangerous, even if understandable. I am not a scientist, so when many scientists tell me that animal testing, done as humanely as possible, is needed to cure my 5 year old, and the research will also help animals, I say, the lesser of the two evils is the proper course. Part of me wants to scream, “Who gives a crap about a couple of apes when it ‘s my baby’s life on the line??!” but reasoning always takes over before I yell and I think: even if my kid wasn’t sick, even if the writing wasn’t on the wall for me, a single mom, I would still have to capitulate. Disease must be cured and that over-population answer is bs, Iana24; if you really felt that way, then why have you gotten any vaccinations? You had better only take herbs, picked out of your own garden when you feel unwell, because anything else would be hypocritical.
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People who feel that overpopulation is a problem never seem to see themselves as part of that problem. It’s always other people who are taking up too many resources.
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I recommend reading “The Selfish Gene” by Richard Dawkins followed by a Bicentennial Malthusian Essay by John Rohe.
Excellent debate here, kudos.
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