The Columbian   August 30, 2002  www.columbian.com                           home

A LOCAL VIEW: ANIMAL RESEARCH CRUEL, UNNECESSARY
By Don Steinke, who taught high school science and math for 36 years

The animal medical research labs claim they have added 20 years to human life.
Absurd.

Life expectancy has increased because of water purification, sewage treatment, the microscope, penicillin and a thousand other advances in health care not based on animal experiments.

Animal experimentation is a $7 billion industry. When clinicians make discoveries by observing humans, animal labs rush in to check out the research and claim credit. They talk and talk, and soon the public starts to believe them. Biologist Adrian Morrison, in an Aug. 4 opinion piece, wants the public to, as the headline put it, "Face facts: Animals are not people."

Charles Mayo, founder of the Mayo Clinic, said, "I know of no achievement through animal experimentation that could not have been obtained some other way, without the cruelty. The whole thing should be abolished, or curbed."

The public would like to believe that animal experimentation is humane and necessary. What good can come out of bashing the heads of dogs and breaking the backs of cats? Why boil guinea pigs to study burns? There are millions of human victims of auto accidents and burns. Study them.

The Animal Welfare Act does not prohibit any experiment, no matter how useless or painful. It just deals with adequate food and shelter. The Animal Welfare Act does not require anesthesia. It does not apply to rats, mice or birds.

It is dangerous to test new drugs on animals because the medical community might believe the labs. Countless times, new treatments have passed the animal test and then moved on to humans with disastrous results: thalidomide, breast implants, Atromid, Eraldin, DES, Oraflex, Valium, Accutane, Halcion, Tegrol and many others. What works on animals seldom works on people the same way. Penicillin kills guinea pigs. Based on animal research, no link was found between cancer and tobacco or asbestos. Polio vaccines were delayed for years because of misleading animal models. Animal experimentation protects the company, not the consumer.

Resources diverted
Animal experimentation is a red herring. It diverts money from real solutions.

Animal labs have spent billions of dollars looking for a cure for cancer and heart disease with no luck. All the while, epidemiology says that eating a low-fat, organic, plant-based diet and reducing pollution can prevent 65 percent of cancers and 85 percent of heart attacks. One pharmaceutical company said, "Animal studies are not done for scientific reasons but for legal reasons. Their predictions are meaningless."

George Bernard Shaw wrote, "Those dullards, with their two-bit Torquemadas, solemnly offering as discoveries, that dogs die if starved and intense pain makes mice sweat. Why has civilization allowed itself to be imposed upon by this rabble of blackguards, dolts and liars?"

Moneim Fadali is a heart surgeon and a commissioner on the Medical Board of California. In his book, "Animal Experimentation," Fadali says he observed a physician anchor a dog to a wall and swing a rock continuously at its ribs. The animal's fright, pain, cries and pleading meant nothing.

Animal experimentation is a habit, an automatic first step in problem solving, a substitute for thinking. Clinical observation is more reliable.  Other alternatives are autopsies, epidemiology, cadavers, plastic models,  cell and tissue and organ cultures, and gene splicing.

Ask the March of Dimes and other charities to stop their experiments with animals. Look for "not tested on animals" on the label. Ask the National Institute of Health to stop funding animal labs.

God did not create animals to live in cages.  Stop the cruelty.

The Columbian September 9, 2002  www.columbian.com
A LOCAL VIEW: IGNORE LIES ABOUT ANIMAL RESEARCH
A pro-vivisection response from  Robert C. Speth,  a professor of Pharmacology and Neuroscience at the College of Veterinary Medicine at Washington State University in Pullman and  adjunct professor of Physiology and Pharmacology at Oregon Health & Science University in Portland. He is a past president of the Society for
Veterinary  Medical Ethics.

It is unfortunate to see a retired science teacher relaying the litany of  lies and rhetoric of the animal rights movement, as in Don Steinke's Aug. 30  local view, "Animal research cruel, unnecessary."

What the animal rights movement doesn't want the public to know is that advances such as water purification and sewage treatment arose from the  animal experiments of Pasteur and Koch. They showed that germs were the  agents that transmitted infectious diseases.

Steinke's comment that our use of penicillin was not based on animal  research is another inaccuracy rampant in animal rights literature. In what  might be one of the most famous experiments ever done, Sir Howard Florey in 1940 used eight mice to demonstrate that penicillin cured streptococcal  infections. This Nobel prize-winning discovery led to the use of penicillin in World War II, which saved the lives of countless soldiers.

As for Charles Mayo, who retired from his medical practice in 1919, he  specified that earnings of the Mayo Clinic be used for medical education and  research. Today part of the Mayo Clinic's mission statement is to "conduct  basic and clinical research programs to improve patient care and to benefit  society." The institution now invests nearly $300 million into animal and  human research programs.

Another animal rightist distortion parroted by Steinke is that animal  testing of drugs poses a danger to humans. Medical history refutes the  animal rightists. Thalidomide caused one of the worst drug-induced disasters  upon humanity because it was not adequately tested on animals. Only after thousands of deformed babies were born was the proper animal testing done.  It showed that thalidomide was teratogenic (a cause of birth defects). Thalidomide was not approved for morning sickness in the United States because Food and Drug Administration inspector Frances Kelsey required it
to be tested on pregnant animals.

A disaster in 1937
A major reason thalidomide was not approved for use in the United States  was because of a disaster that led to the federal Food Drug and Cosmetic Act  of 1938. In 1937, an antibacterial (sulfanilamide) was dissolved in an antifreeze solvent (diethylene glycol) and given to children who subsequently died because diethylene glycol is toxic to the kidneys. This law led to safety testing of substances in animals prior to their use in humans. It has undoubtedly saved us from countless similar disasters. For further information on U.S drug legislation, go to the FDA's Web site
www.fda.gov/opacom/back grounders/miles.html. This should also serve as a  timely reminder of the need to properly store and dispose of antifreeze because cats and dogs will seek out this sweet-tasting lethal substance.

The animal rights movement suffers from deep corruption. The dishonesty  and ignorance of the animal rights movement threatens the health and welfare  of the millions of animals whose lives benefit from the symbiotic  relationship we have with animals. The movement would have us stop doing animal research today, knowing fully that this will interfere with the development of cures for such threats as the West Nile virus disease, which causes suffering and death in human and animal populations.

When you hear stories of animal abuse from animal rightists, ask whether they accurately represent animal usage. There are millions of examples of humane animal use that animal rightists ignore, focusing only on rare incidents of animal abuse. Using their criteria, we should also abolish police departments based on a videotape showing excessive force; we should abolish democracy if a public official violates the law; and we should abolish parenthood if a child is abused. Clearly such changes would lead to anarchy and destroy our society.
Correspondence:  letters@columbian.co

Responses to Speth letter follow.

Sir:  I refer to the OP-ED piece by Robert C. Speth in The Columbian Sept 9.

The major medical discoveries over the last 150 years or so were made despite, and not because of, animal experimentation. As Dr. Brandon Reines, DVM, specialist in the history of medical science & author of "History of  Scientific Discovery") points out, animal experiments WERE carried out in the course of these major medical discoveries, as was human clinical observation and later clinical trials, BUT the animal experiments were not a part of the scientific process which led to the discovery.
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Pro-vivisectionists such as Speth use medical history to support animal experimenta