Dear President of the United States:

Every year about 115 million animals are used for scientific research (“About Animal Testing”). Animal testing is a worldwide issue, that needs to be stopped. According to Peta.org, the animals include mice, fish, rabbits, hamsters, guinea pigs, cats, dogs, rats, farm animals, and human primates. Additionally, the animals are tested for biology reasons, cosmetics testing, for curiosity purposes, chemical reasons, medical training, food purposes, and drug reasons (“Animal Testing”). Imagine your own pet getting tested on, damaging their body severely. Animal testing is disgusting, cruel, and sickening. It needs to be stopped today because it is unreliable, there are other alternatives, and it practices speciesism.

First, the tests scientists get from animal testing are ninety percent unreliable (Collins). Most animals are tested on for cures of illnesses. However, people and animals have cellular, metabolic, and anatomic differences. This means scientist think they have found a cure, but it only cures the animals and will not help cure the humans because of the body differences. Just because it worked on the animals, does not mean it will work on humans.

In addition, in the last decade, scientists have come up with new alternatives rather than testing on animals. According to HSI.org, science labs and hospitals are booming with other alternatives. For instance, hospitals can now give researchers frozen body parts to test on rather than animals. Lastly, science can now grow cells to test on rather making animals suffer. Animal testing kills millions of animals. If scientists have the alternatives, they should use them rather than killing animals.

Finally, animal testing practices speciesism. The root word of speciesism is species. Dictionary.com describes it as “discrimination in favor of one species, usually humans, over another. Especially in the abuse or mistreatment of animals by humans.” The definition even argues my point. We are used to hearing of humans being racist, but never acting out speciesism. However, it is a true problem that should be accounted for. Animal testing is speciesism. If racism is wrong, so is speciesism.

I recognize that you may be thinking animal testing has contributed to saving countless lives and it has many benefits. However, most of the time it does not save lives and there are more drawbacks than advantages. In my second paragraph, I talked about how the tests results are unreliable. These animals are a diverse species and are not exactly like us. You only hear about the few researches that have saved lives, not about the ninety percent of research that has failed. Animals suffer every day, but do not have a voice. We need to be that voice for them. Animal testing is cruel and sickening, it needs to be stopped today because it is unreliable, it practices speciesism, and there are many other alternatives to it.

“The question is not, can they reason, nor, can they talk? But can they suffer?” –Jeremy Bentham

Sincerely,

Madelyn H.