Animal Experimentation: Why It Need to be stopped?

Animal experimentation is a very common phenomenon among the scientists who test these animals to find out and detect many things. The researched number of animals tortured or killed in the name of animal experimentation is inaccurate. However, this animal experimentation is not right and animals should be stopped killing. More efforts should be made to bring the suffering of animals to the forefront.

Animal experimentation has given rise to a lot of speculation among experts and researchers simply because not much is known about it. Gathering information about it is also difficult as one can hardly walk into any laboratory and ask questions about it. There are other sources to gather information.

According to the Animal Welfare Enforcement (AWER) Report published by the United States Department of Agriculture / Animal & Plant Inspection Service (USDA/APHIS) 1,416,643 animals including 69,516 dogs, 25,560 cats, 57,518 primates, 505,009 guinea pigs, 258,754 rabbits, 23,934 sheep, 66,651 pigs, 69126 "other" farm animals, and 166,429 "other" animals were experimented upon in 2000. The report states that 7.4 % of these animals were given no anesthesia when they had to undergo painful experimentation. Unfortunately, most of these statistics are crippled by limitations.

One of the major limitations of these statistics is that they do not take into account rats, mice and non-mammals which are predominantly used for animal experimentation. Most of the times, laboratories do not disclose the number of animals kept by them for breeding purposes. This accounts for inaccurate statistics of the AWE as the research norms call for labs to declare the number of animals experimented upon as well as the animals that are kept for breeding.

Another problem with the AWER is that not all labs report their data on animal experimentation at the same time. In 2000, some 22 labs didn't repot on time, thus significantly bringing down the total from previous years.

To check for the authenticity of the report, it is pertinent to check all the individual reports on animal experimentation and check whether they match up with the larger report. The individual reports of 2000 are not available. However, the 1998 reports, which are available over the net show that the USDA failed to take into account 46% of primates experimented upon in Connecticut, Louisiana and the Harvard Medical School. If such error prevails even now, it is needless to add that the true picture of animal experimentation is far away from us. Thousands of animals are tortured, confined and deprived of their off springs for the benefit of mankind. It is important to find out and reveal the suffering endured by the animals.

Therefore proper steps should be taken seriously by the respective responsible departments so as to stop the animal experimentation for human benefits. Even if it is done, proper care should be taken to ensure that the animal under experimentation do not suffer any pain and torture.