Between 1990 and 1997, USDA registered research laboratories reported killing at least 12,892,885 dogs, cats, primates, guinea pigs, hamsters, rabbits, farm animals, bears, armadillos, squirrels, wild rodents, and other "covered" species. This figure does not include hundreds of millions of rats, mice, frogs, or birds, nor does it include any animals killed at non-USDA registered experimentation labs.

Every second of every day of every year, an animal dies in an experiment in the United States.

What is Vivisection?

Since the time humans developed knives, primitive scientists have cut apart animals. In the name of scientific curiosity, billions of non-human animals have been burnt, crushed, sliced, electrocuted, tortured with drugs, poisoned with toxic chemicals, tormented in psychological testing, and subjected to other atrocities that so-called scientists have been able to develop. Today, this is called animal research, renamed from its initial and primitive title of VIVISECTION. Those who profit from it have renamed the barbaric practice to hide the primitive truth-- that throughout its history, vivisection has been inherently cruel, inevitably wasteful, and perpetually invalid as reliable science.

Vivisectors Deceive the Public

The vivisection industry promises to cure human ills through animal experimentation -- and threatens us with plague and death if vivisection is stopped. They claim that great advances in medical science' could not have been discovered without experimenting on animals. An uninformed public, desperately hoping for cures to disease, believes them, often falling victim to the cruel torment of choosing between a child and an animal-- yet a responsible scientist would never rule out unexplored options.
The facts show this con is perpetuated to allow the ghastly slaughter and the shady and, financially profitable science to continue while ignoring the potential found in research without animals.

These are a few of the countless discoveries made without using vivisection to advance medical science:

• Isolation and transmission of the HIV virus, and the mechanism of HIV transmission
• Discovery of the relationship between cholesterol and heart disease, the #1 cause of death in Americans
• Discovery of the relationship between nutrition and cancer, the #2 cause of death in Americans
• Discovery of penicillin
• Development of x-rays
• Production of Humulin, a synthetic copy of human insulin, which is superior for human health than animal-derived sources.
• Advancements in human medicine, which are based on the human model, are the only truly reliable and responsible research methods. They actually apply to humans rather than irresponsibly and dangerously extrapolating data across different species.

These are a few of the human-based research models:

• Epidemiological studies -- comparative studies of large human populations
• In vitro research -- cell and tissue studies
• Clinical research -- studies of human patients
• Computer modeling - computer programs to predict the effects of external influences on the human biochemical model

All animal species are unique, including humans, and unnatural animal experimentation cannot reveal the secrets of human diseases nor the necessary requirements for a healthy human life. When data from animal experiments have been applied to humans, the results have often been disastrous. Human disease occurs within the complex structure of the human body when a number of variables interact to cause the resulting disorder. These variables can include genetic and environmental influences, negative habits and attitudes, and stress. They may be inherited, self-induced, cumulative. A scientist interested in reliable data must realize animals are another species not subjected to the natural origins of human disease. Because animals differ from humans physiologically and psychologically, the data collected from experiments on them is misleading and harmful when applied to humans.

Your child or your dog?

Those who make money in vivisection want desperately for you to believe you have no options and thus you should feel comfortable with their cruelty. Informed people are able to understand that making such a "choice" is ludicrous and unnecessary for medical advance in humans, and of course it's a clear attempt to manipulate one's emotions. The real choice is... accept that killing a dog will somehow miraculously save a sick child, or demand more reliable and more productive research methods to more quickly cure human illness.

Animal Experimentation is Animal Cruelty

With its roots literally in caves, humans' primitive curiosity with causing suffering, pain, and/or death to animals has always been unspeakably cruel. As science has become more advanced, the cruelty has become more creative, and scientists can keep suffering animals alive longer.

Here are just a few examples of the thousands of experiments funded by tax-payers every year:

• To study the result of head trauma, primates were strapped in machinery to receive high-impact blows to the head that left them with severe brain damage and cruel taunts from vivisectors, as documented by videotape.
  (University of Pennsylvania)
• To examine severe burns on live tissue, pigs were restrained to prevent their escape and then burned alive with a flamethrower until the charred flesh could be removed from the live animals in large pieces
  (U.S. Army)
• To measure recovery from injuries, dogs were strapped down, and vivisectors mutilated the dogs' knees by cutting apart skin to leave flaps. At the end of the study, all dogs were killed.
  (Uniformed Services University -- Department of Defense)
• To demonstrate the eye's protein levels are not different in sight deprived monkeys compared to normal ones, animal experimenters sewed the monkeys' eyelids shut.
  (Emory University, NIH project P51 RR00165-38)
• To test the hypothesis, among others, that it "will result in reductions in body weight, body fat and lean body mass" vivisectors withhold normal amounts and types of food from monkeys.
  (University of Wisconsin-Madison, NIH project P01AG11915-05S1).
• To demonstrate that deaf cats 'meow' louder than cats with hearing, kittens' aural canals were destroyed, and then researchers measured the loudness of their cries.
  (UCLA, Brain Research Institute)
• To create an illness not previously seen in cats, vivisectors successfully created a feline disease that results in jaundice seizures, delayed mental and motor development, and premature death. The diseased animals are bred for other animal experimentation labs.
  (Colorado State University, NIH project R01 RR06886-07)

Just in the time you spend reading this paragraph, eighteen animals are killed in laboratories. These animals die in silence behind sturdy doors armed with state-of-the-art security systems to keep the public out.

Vivisectors do not want the public to see the animals that suffer and die including, dogs, cats, rabbits, primates and monkeys, birds, rats, mice, pigs, birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians, crustaceans, and virtually any other animal that can live in a vivisector's cage or tank. Each of these animals has the capacity to experience pain, as each one seeks to escape it. However, inside the laboratory there is no escape. To intentionally inflict suffering and eventual death on an animal is a barbaric practice, one that could result in a criminal conviction if done in public under any state's law. Yet because vivisection is done behind closed doors at the hands of "scientists" who promise miracle cures in the future, the suffering continues.

The Cruel Diversion of Funds

While millions of Americans cannot go to a physician or hospital because they can't afford medical treatment, when millions of people go hungry every day, when classrooms are overcrowded in schools, when public libraries receive budget cuts, and when neglected prevention programs can avert many diseases if better funded, an obscene amount of money is squandered on animal experimentation.

How much money is spent on vivisection?

Every year, the U.S vivisection industries spend over $18 billion on animal experiments.
The U.S. National Institutes of Health is the world's greatest source that funds animal experimentation, with an annual budget of more than $13 billion.

Here are a few examples how vivisectors spend billions of tax-payer money (via government funded grants):

• To study the results of head trauma, primates were strapped into machinery to receive high-impact blows to the head. A vide-camera captured footage, of vivisectionists taunting the injured animals, who were left with severe brain damage. (University of Pennsylvania)
• To examine severe burns on live tissue, restrained pigs were burned alive with a flamethrower until their charred flesh could be removed in large pieces. (U.S. Army)
• To measure injury recovery, vivisectionists strapped dogs down and cut apart the skin on their knees, leaving flaps. At the end of the study, all of the dogs were killed. (Uniformed Services University-Department of Defense)
• To demonstrate that the eye's protein levels are the same in sight deprived monkeys compared to normal ones, animal experimenters sewed the monkeys' eyelids shut. (Emory University, NIH project P51 RROO165-38)

The Cruel Truth

The image vivisectors present to the public of a happy, anesthetized rat in a comfortable cage is intended to similarly anesthetize the public and thus ward off the horrific outcry that would erupt if the public understood their work. Vivisectors know the rage the public puts on animal cruelty victims, as evident by thousands of letters to judges in high-profile cruelty cases. Vivisectors know this rage would be turned on them if the public viewed their work. To hide the cruelty, animal experimentation laboratories are built without windows, and they have extensive security systems. It's clear that vivisectors do not want the truth exposed to the public.

If you care about animals and humans alike; Study the information! Learn and accept the truth! Oppose the cruelty! Demand better science that can truly help humans!

Information on this page was, compiled by Last Chance for Animals.

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For more information on Vivisection from Africa and around the world - click on the link below :
Animal Rights Africa

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